Africa Growth Pilot/Online self-paced course/Module 4/What requires citations

The reason this is all important is that it allows readers to go and see for themselves.

What requires citations? What do I absolutely have to cite? Ideally, everything. Ideally, every single sentence on Wikipedia should show what it relies on, where it comes from, because I hope you will agree nothing on Wikipedia should be there because Asaf thinks so, right? That's never a good enough reason for something to be on Wikipedia, and nothing should be there because Asaf saw it with his own eyes. That's not good enough; maybe good enough for me! If I saw something with my own eyes, I believe it. But you, you shouldn't believe what I saw with my own eyes. That shouldn't be enough for you. So to the general reader on Wikipedia, of course, that would not be enough. So ideally -- ideally! -- we want to show where everything comes from. Every detail we have on Wikipedia should be traceable to the source it came from. Ideally. In practice, not every single sentence on Wikipedia has a citation; that is the status quo. That is the reality. Although if you followed my advice from last time and have taken a look at some featured articles, you will see that on featured articles -- the best of the best of Wikipedia -- pretty much every single sentence is supported by one or more citations. Almost every sentence. So ideally everything.

But you definitely must cite -- let's talk about things that you simply shouldn't write if you don't have a ready citation to support them. Any fact that is in dispute, or that is likely to be challenged; anything about politics; anything about, say, the mysterious disappearance of this person, or whether or not this person committed suicide. These are things that are dramatic, that are highly likely to be challenged, that may be defamatory if unsupported by a reliable source! If you don't have a citation showing that it's one way rather than the other, don't write it!. You need to have a citation for something like that.

Of course, every quotation should have a citation. This is something we've discussed in module three. Anytime you cite an opinion or a quotation by someone, put it in quotes, so that we know it is a quotation, and attribute it -- meaning, tell us who said that! Don't just put quotes around something without telling us who said it, because then it becomes a weasel phrase -- remember? "people say", "experts agree", right? We do not accept weasel phrases. So put quotes, tell us who said it, and prove to us that they said it by giving us a citation. Where can I see for myself that this person said this? In a book, in a TV interview? Where? How do you know who they said it? I mean, if you're quoting this person, that means you have some source, right? You didn't telepathically get the knowledge that this person said that. So tell us where you got that information. And if you got that information because you heard it from your neighbor, that is not a reliable source, which means you should also not bring it to Wikipedia, even if you personally believe your neighbor. I don't believe your neighbor. So it shouldn't be on Wikipedia.

You should cite any facts that regard objective positive things, like awards or prizes. We already saw that example with the Nobel Prize winner, right? Anytime you assert with Wikipedia's Voice as a fact: "this person won first place in the whatever competition" -- you must provide a citation. You cannot assert an extraordinary achievement by someone without showing that they really have achieved that achievement. If you're talking about an athlete's medals, if you're talking about an academic award, if you're talking about even a negative award, like some writer getting the Worst Sex Scene in Literature award -- there is such a thing! -- That's, you know, maybe a little embarrassing, or funny, but that's a thing that exists. But we wouldn't write it about any particular author unless we can show that they really were given this award, or non-award. So any time we mention something that can be objectively shown to have happened that is exceptional, good or bad, we need to provide a citation.

If we want to mention that someone has been convicted of a crime -- definitely, definitely include a citation. You are putting yourself at significant legal risk if you assert that someone has committed a crime and cannot show a reliable source that shows that they've committed a crime and have been convicted for it. If the person hasn't been convicted, you should say that they have been accused of a crime, or indicted, or are on trial, whatever is the case. But again, with Wikipedia's Voice, you cannot say they have committed the crime until they have been convicted of it. And I stress this in particular because you, you all, all of us, are responsible for what we write. And in extreme cases, people may actually try and sue you based on libel laws, if you made false declarations about them without citations. On the other hand, if you can show that you were quoting what the New York Times said, that this person was convicted, that is a valid legal defense, and you are unlikely to get in trouble for that.

Whenever you cite a number or a statistic -- if you want to state that the size of population of Egypt is so-and-so, definitely needs a citation! Where did this number come from? Any kind of statistic, if you want to say that, say, 1 in 10 road accidents is caused under the influence of alcohol. You need to show us where that number comes from, where that statistic comes from.

Now, other facts may or may not have citations -- again, in practice! Ideally, we want everything to have a citation, but it often is the case that when you cover someone, there are some facts that don't have a very good citation. For instance: notable people generally have aspects of their lives fairly well documented, their achievements, their opinions, etc. But most people are not born notable. When they were born, nobody knew they're going to be notable. (Some people are born notable. Like princes.) But most people are not born notable. And so the fact of their birth, the date of their birth, the place of their birth, are not always recorded in what we would call a reliable source. So sometimes we don't really have a reliable source for someone's birth village that's better than what they say themselves. They tell us in some interview, maybe, "I was born in this village", and that's not a very objective source. It's certainly not an academic source or a scientific source. And yet, that may be literally the only source in the world showing that this person was born in that village. I mean, this person's statement. Or, if we could get to them, maybe this person's relatives' or neighbors' statements.

Those are pretty much the only people in the world who can attest that this person was born there. Unless we have a birth certificate, for example! If we have a document that is a birth certificate, that's a better source. But we don't generally have access to the birth certificates of the people we write about. Right? So I'm giving this example of birthplace as one of those things that are very often difficult to establish with a good source. And we may have to settle for a less-than-good source.

On the other hand, a person's birth village is often a lot less controversial than whether or not they won the Nobel Prize, or are the fastest athlete, right? Very few people would be interested in casting a lot of doubt on a person's birth village. Of course, again, there are exceptions. There are some cases where people make some political use of the fact that they were, or weren't, born somewhere. But generally, that's a fact that I would say is low stakes. It doesn't terribly matter one way or the other. And we are okay with repeating the information that the person offered, if that's the best source that we have. Alternatively, we can leave it out completely and just not mention where this person was born because we are unable to establish it at all.