Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates/Tecumseh/archive1

TFA blurb review

Tecumseh (c. 1768 – October 5, 1813) was a Shawnee chief and warrior who promoted resistance to the expansion of the United States onto Native American lands. During Tecumseh's childhood, the Shawnees lost territory to the expanding American colonies in a series of border conflicts. A persuasive orator, Tecumseh traveled widely, forming a Native American confederacy and promoting tribal unity. He proclaimed that Native Americans owned their lands in common, and urged tribes not cede territory unless all agreed. His message alarmed American leaders and some Native leaders. In the War of 1812, Tecumseh joined his cause with the British, recruiting warriors and helping to capture Detroit in 1812. In 1813, Tecumseh retreated with the British into Upper Canada, where American forces engaged them at the Battle of the Thames, in which Tecumseh was killed. His death caused his confederacy to collapse, but he became an iconic folk hero in American, Indigenous, and Canadian history. (Full article...)

1,002 characters, including spaces.

Hi Kevin1776 and anyone else interested: a draft blurb for this article is above. Thoughts, comments and edits are welcome. Gog the Mild (talk) 20:22, 17 August 2021 (UTC)

Looks good. I made a couple edits based on some rewording that was done to the article. Kevin1776 (talk) 21:34, 7 September 2021 (UTC)

HF

• Native Americans and Indians are use interchangeably in the article, I feel like it might be best to standardize usage
  • This is definitely the most thorny issue when writing about Native Americans with ties to both Canada and the US. Many of our reliable sources use them interchangeably, especially the most recent ones. I preemptively wrote about this on the article's talk page, since I figure it will be only major point of discussion in the future. Our Canadian sources stay away from both these terms (favoring "Native"), and few scholars use "Native Americans," even though that's what American schoolchildren are now taught to use. I've tried an approach that will not offend or trigger drive-by editors (particularly by keeping "Indians" out of the lede, which is the only thing many will read). It's hard to know what the best approach is for the body of the article, although I think it's in line with our modern sources to toggle between "Native" and "Indian."
    • I'm fine with that. (I used Native Americans for my FAC of First Battle of Newtonia, but that's a strictly American topic)
• "Tecumseh, now about eighteen years-old," - My gut instinct is that this hyphen should not be there. Punctuation is not my strong suit, though.
  • I think you're right about this. Hyphen has been removed.
• "Among these was Tecumseh's younger brother Lalawéthika, later known as Tenskwatawa, a healer in Tecumseh's village - I think we can simplify this introduction, as Tenskwatawa was already introduced in the section before.
  • Good call. Since Tenskwatawa is known here by three names, I went a bit overboard to make sure readers knew it was the same guy. I've simplified this reference.
• "Tecumseh followed his brother's teachings by eating only Native food" - Not sure that native should be capitalized here
  • I believe the scholarly trend is to use Native (capitalized) in preference for "Indian" or "Native American." But I see what you mean, this could be small-case, descriptive usage rather than a synonym for "Indian." Maybe "traditional" would work better here.
    • If it's the scholarly trend, then it's fine.
• "Jortner (2011) argues that" - A little awkward to introduce the source this way. Maybe "The historian Adam Jortner argues that ...". This sort of thing appears elsewhere. I think it's awkward, but I wouldn't oppose over this if you want to keep it as is.
  • I like that style, because it succinctly informs the reader how recent the cited scholarship is without having multiple occurrences of the phrase "the historian so-and-so says..." , but I know it's not widespread practice on Wikipedia and can seem odd.
    • That's fine, then, since it's inline attribution. Use of parenthetical citations for inline references was deprecated last fall, but it's fine for inline attribution.
• Maybe work in that he is a Persons of National Historic Significance?
  • That's a good idea. I recently noticed a reliable reference for the year it happened, so it's been added.

That's it from me. An excellent article on a very important historical figure. Hog Farm _Talk 05:08, 14 March 2021 (UTC)

• • Thank you for these helpful comments! Kevin1776 (talk) 06:21, 14 March 2021 (UTC)

Dumelow

Comments moved from main review page due to issues with size of FAC list:

Comments on "Early life" section:

• Shawnees pronounced his name as "Tecumtha." Per WP:LQ I think the punctuation should be outside the quotation marks, ie: "Tecumtha".

In addition, should we include this pronunciation in the lead and/or provide IPA guidance here?

Finally, did they only pronounce the name this way in the past or still do so? It is written in past tense

• in the 17th century Beaver Wars I think this should be "17th-century" as it is a compound adjective describing the Beaver Wars
• After the battle, Shawnees ceded Kentucky to the American colonists reference to American colonists comes just after referring to the British, to avoid confusion perhaps best to be consistent.
• You switch between "present-day" and "present" when describing modern day placenames. Would consistency here be good?

Comments on "From warrior to chief" section:

• After the American Revolutionary War, the United States claimed the lands north of the Ohio River by right of conquest. worth adding a date here, presumably after Yorktown (1781)?

Comments on "Rise of the Prophet" section

• Lalawéthika (Tenskwatawa) we've already stated his alternative name and relationship to Tecumseh earlier, could this now be omitted?
• Although many Indian leaders signed the treaty, many who used the land were deliberately excluded from the negotiations close repetition of "many" sounds a little off to me, but I can't think of a better way to reword it at the moment
• The treaty created widespread outrage among Indians, and "put Tecumseh on the road to war" with the United States who are we quoting here?

Comments on "Forming a confederacy" section:

• Tecumseh demanded that Harrison rescind the Fort Wayne cession, and promised he would oppose American settlement on the disputed lands is promised the best word here? I initially read it as a concession Tecumseh was making in a negotiation, rather than a threat

Comments on "War of 1812" section:

• He and his warriors scouted and probed enemy positions as American General William Hull crossed into Canada, threatening to take Fort Malden. it's not clear here who is threatening Fort Malden; Hull or Tecumseh?
• The British and Indians had inflicted heavy casualties on the Americans outside the fort, but failed to capture it. Procter's Canadian militia and many of Tecumseh's warriors left after the battle, so they were compelled to lift the siege not clear who "they" are? Procter and Tecumseh? Perhaps the sentence can be rearranged to make this clear?
• According to another tradition, an Ojibwe named Oshahwahnoo Ojibwe is not linked (or mentioned) previously and could benefit from a link
• The matter became controversial in the 1830s when Johnson was a candidate for national office what national office, or was it several?
• Indian barrier state is linked twice in the main text

Comments on "Legacy" section:

• HMCS Tecumseh italicise the name of the establishment
• maybe link "outdoor drama", I was not aware of the term

Comments on lead:

• The following year he led an unsuccessful campaign against Americans in Ohio and Indiana. the main text only mentions two battles in Indiana, the unsuccessful sieges of Fort Wayne and Fort Harrison, in this period
• When U.S. naval forces took control of Lake Erie in 1813 the main text doesn't say the US took control of Lake Erie, only that they won the battle

That's all from me on the prose. Looking good - Dumelow (talk) 17:58, 25 March 2021 (UTC)

SandyGeorgia

Beautifully competent writing.

• Can one instance of “probably” be varied ... maybe to likely or may have or something else? Tecumseh was probably born in ... Tecumseh's mother, Methoataaskee, probably belonged to ...
• In terms of myths on the internet based on old research, have you seen https://www.britannica.com/biography/Tecumseh-Shawnee-chief ? It is based on Tucker (an older publication) and says things like ... Tecumseh was raised by his sister after his mother left him while our article says his sister raised Tecumseh’s son. And it claims a hatred of whites caused his mother. It also claims that Drake is a good bio. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Tecumseh-Shawnee-chief/additional-info#content-1 What do you say about these sources and some of the info in EB that may be dated?

SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:36, 9 April 2021 (UTC)

Sandy, thank you as always for your comments. I changed one of the "probably"s to a "likely." I have seen the EB article. Glenn Tucker's work on Tecumseh, written in the 1950s by a journalist, is no longer taken seriously by scholars, who dismiss it as a "mixture of fact and historical legend," with sometimes harsher criticism than that. The "race war" idea so important to Tucker in the '50s has been discounted by modern scholars. Drake's important bio from 1841 is now used by scholars as essentially a primary source, since Drake contacted many people who knew Tecumseh. It's too dated for us to cite directly, since some ethnographic errors and folk tales are included, but Drake's work forms the backbone of the modern biographies. Thanks again! Kevin1776 (talk) 18:59, 9 April 2021 (UTC)

Thx, Kevin1776, not surprised, as expected! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:17, 9 April 2021 (UTC)