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Siobhan Leachman

Wikipedia: User:Ambrosia10

ORCID: 0000-0002-5398-7721

Slides: bit.ly/ConnectEverythingAWMM

Connect everything

Image by Auckland Museum CC BY 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons

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Images: Wikidata/Wikipedia/Wikicommons CC BY SA 3.0 via WikiCommons

My main projects

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My main editing interests

Biodiversity
Women
New Zealand
People in biodiversity
New Zealand fauna and flora

Can you spot what’s missing in the image? (Spoiler - INSECTS)

Image by New Zealand Government, CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons

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Image of Orra White Hitchcock by John L. Lovell. Public domain. Image of Anna Antoinette Weber van Bosse via University of Amsterdam, Artis Library. Public domain. Image of Janet Russell Perkins. Public domain.

Women who contribute to Natural History

I particularly like to highlight women scientists, particularly women who historically contributed to biodiversity knowledge.

There are numerous under-acknowledged women who have contributed to biodiversity knowledge by collecting specimens, undertaking research or by publishing scientific articles. However these women and their contributions are often overlooked. Historically many of these women were unable to enter universities to get educated, or if they were able to get educated, were then unable to get positions in academia or employment in the professions they had trained for. Often their contributions to science were curtained by the social norms of the day, for example they may not have been able to join scientific societies.

If possible I’m keen to get these women into Wikipedia by writing articles on them.

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Museums

Digitise content

Place on public platforms

Allow open reuse

Image: Steereomitrium minutum E.O.Campb. by New York Botanical Garden, CC BY 4.0

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I see women scientists

Biodiversity literature

Specimen labels

Museum websites

Screenshot of The fossil Elateridae of Florissant , public domain. Specimen sheet held in the United States National Herbarium CC0, via Wikimedia Commons. Screenshot of Te Papa website reused under section 43 of the New Zealand Copyright Act 1994.

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And put them in Wikipedia

Screenshot of Wikipedia article on Ella Campbell on 6 September 2023 CC BY-SA 4.0

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Why?

Be what you see

Helps correct historic record

Raises profile of woman

Internet search engines

Encourages researchers

Fight bias

Image: Baltimore and Ohio railroad catalogue. Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Why do I do this? Firstly, because I’m a great believer that if you see it you can be it. I’m wanting to inspire people to follow in the footsteps of these amazing women. Also writing Wikipedia articles helps correct the historic record. Many people think women didn’t actively contribute to science in great numbers until after the 1950s. This view is just. so. wrong. So I write Wikipedia articles to attempt to correct this belief.

Wikipedia is one of the most popular websites in the world. And because Wikipedia is openly licensed, its content can and is reused EVERYWHERE. An article will help raise the profile of the woman and her contributions. It results in internet search engines such as Google picking up that content and reusing it when someone searches for that scientist. And having a Wikipedia page encourages other researchers to undertake and publish further research on the woman and her work.

Finally like many encyclopaedias that rely on secondary sources Wikipedia itself has a bias problem. For example currently only 20% of all the biographies in Wikipedia are about women. So Wikipedia is missing a LOT of information on and about women and their work. By increasing the number of articles about women and their contributions, I’m helping fill these gaps and reducing this bias.

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Image by Priscilla Susan Bury via BHL. Public Domain in the US.

Notability for Wikipedia

Significant coverage

Reliable sources

Independent of subject

BUT getting a Wikipedia article is hard. Because Wikipedia has a notability criteria. To be notable for the purposes of Wikipedia and to be eligible for a Wikipedia article, the woman needs to have significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the woman.

Unless a person reaches that level of notability they won’t be eligible for a Wikipedia article. Any article that is created where the person doesn’t reach that notability criteria is likely to be deleted. And because women are less likely to be covered in secondary sources such as newspaper or journal articles, books, and other publications, are less likely to be nominated for and receive awards, and are less likely to have their work cited, hurdling that Wikipedia notability criteria can be a challenge.

But even if she can’t have a Wikipedia article currently, I will still add information on her to OTHER Wikipedia articles. And then I’ll red link her name - that is create a wiki link to an article about her that has yet to be created. Red links are important. They can help inspire other research - either by Wiki editors or by independent researchers whose work may push her over the notability criteria bar.

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Need a foot

in the door

Image by Siobhan Leachman CC0

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Wikidata

Linked

Open reuse

Knowledge graph

Queryable

Low nobility criteria

And that place is Wikidata. Wikidata is to databases, like Wikipedia is to encyclopaedias. Wikidata is a gigantic linked open knowledge base that has millions of items. These items relate to people, publications, towns, institutions, art works, species, you name it.

And these items link to other items in Wikidata creating this knowledge web. So looking at person items, these contain factual statements about the person, which then link to other wikidata items. The Wikidata item also contains links to other databases that hold information about that person. And all this data is openly licensed, freely reusable and can be queried and also visualised. And most important of all for me, Wikidata has a very low notability criteria. So if I’m working on getting a woman scientist folded into the Wikiverse I definitely make sure she’s got a Wikidata item.

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Create or Enrich Wikidata

Screen shot of Wikidata item CC BY-SA 4.0

If needed I’ll create a Wikidata item for her and enrich it with as much information as I can find, adding references supporting those statements and also linking to any institutions that may hold information on her.

Here you can see I’ve managed to link this teacher and botanical collector to information about her held at the Alexander Turnbull Library, part of the National Library of New Zealand. Sometimes because I’m aware this woman did amazing work and hasn’t got much of a profile I’ll go an extra step further and add or create profiles on other sites so that I can then add those identifiers to Wikidata. The example here is the site Bionomia. This site helps link museum specimens to their collectors.

As I know Gretchen is a botanical collector, and I have her death date, I’ve been able to create a profile for her in Bionomia, linked specimens to her in that profile, then added that profile identifier back into Wikidata. I’ve done the same in sites like FamilySearch, WikiTree etc to attempt to help both enrich items but also inspire others on THOSE platforms to research women’s lives.

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Wikidata Cradle tool

Gives schema for items

Guides editors

Gives confidence

Toy, cradle and dolls. Auckland Museum, CC BY 4.0 , via Wikimedia Commons

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Why?

Raises profile of woman

Internet search engines

Encourages researchers

Data in Wikidata is REUSED

Image: Baltimore and Ohio railroad catalogue. Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

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Examples of Reuse

Screenshot of Histropedia.

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Picture > 1000 words

Images or creations by you

Public domain in US AND NZ

Openly licensed images

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Copyright resources

Cornell University

Creative commons

Where to find images

HD@DH.nrw | Michelle Dahlmanns, CC BY 4.0 , via Wikimedia Commons

To find out more about the US copyright law and restrictions on reuse I find the Cornell University copyright site really helpful. So I’ve added a link to the slides.

I’ve also added a link to Creative commons so you can find out more about Creative commons reuse licences.

Finally I’ve added a link that lists a few places where you can find images.

My particular favourites are: DigitalNZ, Papers past, Auckland Museum, Te Papa, the National Library, the Hocken Collection. I also find Familysearch website useful as it can provide access to passport photos which may be in the public domain.

As for living people you can reach out to them via email as ask for them to upload a selfie into Wikicommons. In fact any time you go to a public event consider taking images of important folk who have wikipedia page potential and adding an image yourself to Wikicommons. I normally attempt to go up to them if I have a chance to get their approval of the image I’ve taken.

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Help with editing

Article talk page

WikiProjects

WikiProject New Zealand

Aotearoa NZ meetup resources

Meetups & editathons

Screenshot of Aotearoa New Zealand meetup template CC BY SA 4.0

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© Siobhan Leachman, 2023. Unless indicated otherwise for specific images, this slide deck is licensed for re-use under the Creative Commons Zero 1.0 International licence. Please note that this licence does not apply to any images. Those specific items may be re-used as indicated in the image rights statement within each slide. In essence, you are free to copy, distribute and adapt this slide deck, as long as you abide by the other licence terms.