Rachel Helps (BYU)

About Me

I am the Wikipedian-in-Residence for the BYU Library. This is my account for edits I make for work. I make personal edits under the account Rwelean.

Topic ban (TBAN)

I have been banned from editing LDS Church-related content on Wikipedia because I did not sufficiently disclose my external relationships in my personal editing. Specifically, I did not disclose that I am friends with Michael Austin (writer) when I created that page, nor did I disclose that I have contributed to The ARCH-HIVE when I created that page. I am not allowed to edit any page related to the LDS Church. This include pages for people who are members of the LDS Church. This includes participating in talk page discussions. I am allowed to disclose any further details about my COIs on pages I've edited. I am happy to assist with research and discuss what I know of Mormon studies off-wiki. Feel free to email me from the "Email this user" link under the "User" dropdown.

A partial appeal of this topic ban on ANI was not passed.

Presentations and handouts I've made

I've made some content to help others learn about various aspects of Wikipedia and Wikimedia. Please feel free to reuse them as long as you credit me as the original author.

Leveraging the Power of Wikipedia and Wikidata for Your Library - How Wikipedia can help libraries and how libraries can help Wikipedia. Short introductory presentation for the Utah Library Association in 2023. My colleague Nicole Lewis presented the Wikidata portion.
Why Wikipedians-in-Residence Should Edit Wikipedia - Wikipedia has many content gaps. Wikimedians-in-Residence are perfectly positioned to help fill some of them. Presentation for Wikimedia+Libraries and Wikimania's WREN session in 2022.
Redefining Outreach "Failure" - We have measured outreach success through the number of attendees, edits, and new pages created. But what are some other ways that outreach can succeed? Another presentation for Wikimedia+Libraries 2022.
Guide to Writing Children's Book Pages on Wikipedia - This is an in-depth guide I made for our Coretta Scott King Award edit-a-thon in February 2019. I also put it on Wikipedia as a how-to essay.
How to track and increase page views for images on the Wikimedia Commons - short presentation I gave at 2018 Wikiconference North America. Depending on when you're reading this, the tracking tools may or may not still work.
Mix'n'match and your data - another presentation I gave at 2018 Wikiconference North America. Mix'n'match is a tool you can use to link database records to their corresponding Wikidata items. This could be part of a "linked data" initiative at your library! Wikidata is still in an early phase where everyone is adding stuff. I like to think of contributing to Wikidata as making deposits in a databank. The more everyone contributes good data, the more it will be useful to everyone (we hope).
Editing Wikipedia as a PR Person - some people think that PR people shouldn't edit Wikipedia at all, but I don't think we can stop them. Let's teach them how they can contribute.
Dreamyshade has an excellent "Wikipedia in 15 minutes" presentation. I made a handout based on the presentation for a volunteer organization at BYU that usually works with family history and record transcription. It has a lot of information specific to their group, but maybe you will find it helpful.
Simple English Wikipedia - a presentation I gave to a linguistics class to prepare them for an assignment to "translate" a page from English Wikipedia to Simple English Wikipedia. Be sure to see the notes on each slide for the relevant information--I give a nice overview of what linguists have done with Simple English Wikipedia in the notes on slide 4. Also, I have since found out that copy-pasting from VE to VE is effective and retains references (so copy-pasting from source editor to another source editor isn't required). There may be issues with other page elements, however.

Conflict of Interest statements

Blanket Conflict of Interest statement (these and others below AML added March 13, 2024)

I would like to issue a general conflict of interest statement for all of the pages I have ever edited. As I edit any page, I grow to develop a relationship with the subject of it. As such, I am not a neutral party to it. I will attempt to list the possible, more specific potential and actual conflict of interests below.

Conflict of Interest statement - BYU

I am the Coordinator of Wikipedia Initiatives at the Harold B. Lee Library. I am employed by Brigham Young University (BYU) to improve Wikipedia. I'll do my best to maintain a neutral POV, but there's no way to eradicate unconscious bias. Please contact me via my talk page if you'd like to make my unconscious bias conscious. My compensation is hourly and not contingent on any particular contribution. However, curators and other librarians sometimes request that I work on certain pages. You can find most, if not all, of the pages we have worked on under Category:Harold_B._Lee_Library-related_articles.

March 14, 2024 addition: there has been some question about if I and my students have the intellectual freedom to summarize information that is critical of the LDS Church. This is something I've worried about in the past and have consulted with my supervisors about. We are free to, and often do, summarize reliable sources that are critical or unflattering of the LDS Church and its leaders.

May 2024 addition: Back in 2016 I was still trying to figure out what kind of work was appropriate for me. Our HR person suggested that I work on a page for a donor our library. I said I would try, but couldn't guarantee any specific kind of content (right, I should never have agreed to do that). I spent several weeks researching and creating a page in my sandbox for a man who made his fortune off of real estate (he's dead now). There were definitely enough sources on him for him to pass notability guidelines. One of my main sources was actually a biography commissioned by his trust. After I was happy with what I wrote in my sandbox, I sent it to the HR person, who sent it on to someone at the trust. The trust people hated it because I mentioned that the houses he built were not available to black people to purchase, as was the case with a lot of homes built then (a detail in the biography THEY commissioned, which I guess they also didn't like). Our HR person told me not to publish it.

Conflict of Interest Statement - AML

I am currently on the board for the Association for Mormon Letters (AML), a volunteer organization that promotes Mormon literature. I believe there is an overlap of interests between AML, the BYU Library, and Wikipedia in supplying accurate information about Mormon authors to the public. My students have worked on the AML Wikipedia page and the Wikipedia page for AML's periodical, Irreantum. The BYU Library and our special collections contain the papers of past AML presidents and we have the old AML annuals on our stacks. I created a page for Melissa Leilani Larson before I was a member of the board. I have been on four judging panels for the AML awards, and I have not created pages for books that won awards that I was a judge for.

(expansion March 13, 2024) In 2024, I am not on a judging panel this year, but I am the liaison between judges and publishers for the categories of graphic novel and short story.

One of my students created the page for James Goldberg at the request of a curator, in conjunction with the library acquiring his personal papers. I assigned this to one of my students rather than myself because I know James personally. James and I were in graduate school in the same program in 2010. We had a creative writing class together that we took from John Bennion. I believe that James currently works at the Church History Library and he is on the advisory board for the Center for Latter-day Saint Arts. James's younger brother, Mattathias Singh, was an employee of mine as nanny for my children for about two years. James and Mattathias have contributed to library exhibits outside of my involvement. Mattathias is now the literature curator at Writ and Vision, a local hub for Mormon literature events, where the ARCH-HIVE has had their annual show for several years.

I started a Discord group for members of the Association for Mormon Letters to share information and discuss Mormon criticism. I created a channel for discussion of my Wikipedia work there because I wanted feedback from other interested editors and I often had a hard time getting feedback on my edits on individual talk pages. I never asked members of our Discord to comment or vote a certain way on any page. I have used it to ask for help with research, for opinions on administrative things, and to vent about frustrations about my work.

Conflict of Interest Statement - Member of the LDS Church and the Book of Mormon

I am a member of the LDS Church. As an active member, I donate 10% of my income to the church. I attend services on Sundays. I personally believe that the Book of Mormon is sacred writ. I do not believe that the question of whether or not the book is an archeological document is important to its spiritual meaning in my life.

Conflict of Interest Statement - Relief Society

I am a member of the women's organization for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) which is called the Relief Society.

Conflict of Interest Statement - Pioneer heritage

I am partially descended from Mormon pioneer ancestry. While all humans on the earth are related to each other somehow, I am more closely related to Utah pioneers than a typical human. One of my ancestors, Caleb Baldwin, was mentioned in the Doctrine and Covenants. He does not have a Wikipedia page.

Conflict of Interest Statement - Graduate student at Brigham Young University studying Mormon literature

My work as a scholar of Mormon literature is extremely intertwined with my Wikipedia work. For this reason, I am listing potential COIs as well as possible COIs. I am currently a graduate student at Brigham Young University. I am writing my thesis on Mormon literature. My thesis committee (as of January 2024) consists of Christopher Blythe, Michael Austin, and Matthew Wickman. Christopher Blythe is a past editor of the Journal of Mormon History. However, he was not the editor who coordinated the peer reviews of the article on the Relief Society literary curriculum that I recently published with Michael Austin. Neither was he the peer review coordinator for the upcoming article I am publishing on the Mormon Esperanto Society. His wife, Christine Blythe, was a co-worker of mine until last year. She worked as the folklore curator in the BYU Library; she is now the executive director of the Mormon History Association.

Michael Austin has published a lot on Mormon studies in a professional capacity. We have been using his recent Testimony of Two Nations as one of the sources for literary criticism of the Book of Mormon. He is on the board of Dialogue. He was a co-founder of BCC Press, and was its publication editor until late 2023 (an unpaid, volunteer position). We are presenting on Mormon hymnody at the Mormon History Association conference in a panel we put together on the topic with another employee of the BYU library. After we met at the Mormon History Association conference in 2022 (which I attended in a work capacity), I created a Wikipedia page for him using my personal account to avoid a possible COI with paid editing (meaning: I did this editing off-the-clock and I was not paid for it). Mike expressed an interest in editing and creating pages related to some of his research interests. Around this time, the BYU Library held an event where we showed a restored version of Corianton: A Story of Unholy Love. Mike has provided me with emotional support when I have expressed distress to him about other Wikipedia editors. On several occasions he has contributed to the discussions I complained to him about. After I created the Wikipedia page for Mike with my personal account, we became co-authors. After we became co-authors, Mike became my thesis advisor.

Matthew Wickman's memoir, Life to the Whole Being was among the ones I judged as a member of the judging panel for memoirs for the Association for Mormon Letters awards that I judged last year (for publications in 2022). His memoir did not win the award for memoir. I took a class from Wickman in 2011 and am taking a class from him in 2024.

I have recently submitted a chapter on Nephi Anderson's novella "Beyond Arsareth" to a collection that Sarah Reed and Scott Hales are editing. Before I decided to contribute a chapter, I improved the bibliography section on the Nephi Anderson page as part of my work to help other people who might want to study Anderson's works, which were often published periodically and can be a pain to track down. Many of the periodicals his work appears in have been digitized by the BYU Library. In the process of editing, I used and improved the research resources on Nephi Anderson that Scott and Sarah are developing. Scott Hales currently works at the Church History Library and his dissertation was on Mormon literature. Sarah is a professor here at BYU. Scott's Garden of Enid comic is listed on a page I created, List of Mormon cartoonists.

In fall 2023, I attended the Book of Mormon Association conference in a work capacity. One of the organizers, Kim Matheson, is an acquaintance of mine outside of my work. I brought two of my students with me to this conference as part of their job, where we met in-person many of the authors whose work we have been citing in our improvements to Book of Mormon pages. These authors included John Thomas, Robert Rees, Elizabeth Fenton, Jared Hickman, Joseph Spencer, Rosalynde Welch, and many others. We have cited works from most of the scholars who were present at the conference. In my pre-conference presentation, which I have made available on YouTube, I called for other Book of Mormon scholars to join our work in editing Wikipedia. However, the only person to take me up on this challenge was my friend Mike. Under my direction, he created the Killing of Laban page and expanded Sam (Book of Mormon) as a volunteer editor.

When I wrote the page for Steven L. Peck and his bibliography at the request of our 21st-century manuscripts curator for my work, I was a fan of his work. I have since become Steve Peck's friend, and we presented together on Mormon aesthetics at the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley in April 2024. Steve is a part-time member of the Maxwell Institute. He is also a member of the advisory board for the Center for Latter-day Saint Arts.

Hydrangeans and I have attended several of the same academic conferences related to Mormon studies. We are friends.

In 2023 and 2022 I attended the Utah folklore society conference. The Utah folklore society is led by Christine and Chris Blythe, mentioned earlier. In 2023, I presented in my capacity as a graduate student. I met the authors of This is the Plate, a book I cited previously in my work on Mormon foodways. Eric A. Eliason has also written articles I have previously cited on Mormon folklore and my student has cited on Three Nephites.

In 2023, I attended the Mormon Scholars in the Humanities conference in a work capacity, presenting on research on the Mormon Esperanto Society that I did on my personal time. At this conference, I met many Mormon studies people. One of the people in leadership in the Mormon Scholars in the Humanities (but who was not at the conference) is now one of the editors at Wayfare Magazine, where I have published an article I received $50 for. All of the other publications I have mentioned have been unpaid.

I am currently taking a class on the Victorian social novel from Leslee Thorne-Murphy. Her husband, John Murphy, is a curator in the BYU Library. Several years ago, she organized an exhibit at the library on literature of the Victorian bazaar. In conjunction with that exhibit, I improved Charity bazaar. Thorne-Murphy has since published a book on Bazaar literature. I recently shared resources with her about how to edit Wikipedia.

At the request of one of my curator colleagues, I improved the page for Glen Nelson. We have the libretto for his "Book of Gold" opera in our archives. In 2024, after my topic ban, Glen interviewed me on a podcast for the Center for Latter-day Saint Arts, and organization he co-founded with Richard Bushman. Richard Bushman's wife, Claudia Lauper Bushman, is another person whose page I have worked on. The periodical Claudia co-founded, Exponent II, has had its back issues digitized and posted to archive.org through the BYU Library's digitization department. A friend of mine from graduate school, and a relative through marriage, Katie Rich, is publishing a history of the Exponent II; my work on the Claudia Bushman page preceded her book project.

Conflict of Interest Statement - The ARCH-HIVE

I am a current patron of the ARCH-HIVE on Patreon. I participate in this community of Mormon artists. Their shows have featured work by artists whose pages I have worked on for work, for example, Matt Page (artist), whose page I created when our 21st-century curator requested that I work on his page after acquiring some of his personal papers. I created a Wikipedia page for the ARCH-HIVE on my personal time with my personal account to avoid COI as a paid editor (although this didn't avoid COI as an unpaid editor; I disclosed this COI in the DYK nomination for the page when I initially created it).

Conflict of Interest Statement - LDS periodicals

I subscribe to Wayfare, Dialogue, Sunstone, and Exponent II. I have contributed a book review to Dialogue for a book by Jennifer Quist.

Conflict of Interest Statement - WikiJournal of Humanities

I was on the editorial board for the WikiJournal of Humanities.

My students

I employ BYU students who edit Wikipedia under my supervision. My current students are:

Former student workers

Pages I've worked on

Mormon women

Lucinda Lee Dalton - early Mormon feminist and frequent writer in The Exponent
Desideria Quintanar de Yáñez - first woman baptized in the LDS Church in Mexico
Alice Louise Reynolds - first woman professor at BYU
Maurine Whipple - author of the Mormon epic The Giant Joshua (1941)
Nellie Gubler - local historian in southern Utah
Celestia Taylor - early BYU professor in English and writer for Relief Society magazine
Claudia Lauper Bushman - Mormon historian who helped found Exponent II
Sandra Tayler - author and editor
Belle S. Spafford (nominated) - 9th Relief Society president
Traci Hunter Abramson - popular writer of spy novels
Cynthia B. Lee - CS professor at Stanford
Wendy Watson Nelson - former professor of Marriage and Family Therapy; wife of LDS President Russel M. Nelson
Julia Mavimbela - teacher and early convert in South Africa
Phyllis Barber - author and autobiographer

Mormon history

Mormon arts

BYU history

Local bands

Library and other special collections-related pages

Q: Hey Rachel, isn't working on the Harold B. Lee Library's page a conflict of interest, since you work there?
A: Yes, I did have a conflict of interest! I wasn't going to edit the page, but a previous copyvio put the page out of commission. I completely rewrote it so a page would exist. My edit history is available for anyone to examine. Other editors looked over the page. COI editing is strongly discouraged but allowed when the editing is within Wikipedia's content guidelines. I'm happy to talk about it more if you have questions.