For this week’s blog post assignment I read the article History of Hispanic and Latino Americans in the United States on Wikipedia. Although at first glance it seemed to be a well written article, there were a few instances where problems showed themselves. Although these issues were small and easily fixed, they were still noticeable enough to detract from the article as a whole.

One such problem spot was in the first section of the article, titled “Spanish Expeditions in the South of North America.” The last paragraph, in particular, should have a citation after it talks about an event 80 years prior to John Smith’s rescue by Pocahantas, when “Juan Ortiz told of his similar rescue from execution by an Indian girl.” In the context of the section of the article, which references events in the history of Spanish interactions with the Americas that contradict the idea that England colonized North America first, the information makes sense. However, without a citation, it is unsubstantiated and should either be properly cited or removed.

Another issue I found with the article was that there occasionally seemed to be unnecessary details that didn’t add to the overall idea. For instance, in the section titled “Hispanic and Latino presence in the former British colonies of the United States at the end of the eighteenth century” there is a brief mention of a Spanish lieutenant in the Revolutionary War named Jorge Farragut. Although the information about Farragut is useful and relevant, the next sentence, which mentions his son, is not. Farragut’s son was a flag officer in the American Civil War. Although this is interesting information, it is not relevant to a paragraph that’s main focus is Spanish involvement in the American Revolution. As such, the extra information should be deleted from the article.

Overall, however, the article appeared to be fairly well put together. The information is, for the most part, relevant to the article. The links appear to all be in working order and the images and graphs included enhance the information present. Furthermore, there does not seem to be a particular bias one way or another in the article. All in all, it is very well done.