# Talk:Bukit Brown Cemetery

This review is transcluded from Talk:Bukit Brown Cemetery/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.
Nominator: Actuall7 (talk · contribs) 12:24, 14 August 2024 (UTC)
Reviewer: Chipmunkdavis (talk · contribs) 09:19, 16 October 2024 (UTC)

Starting this review. There is one FA cemetery article and a couple of GA articles which I will be looking at as potential examples. As initial notes, the lead will need some editing, it has some puffery language ("lush vegetation and diverse wildlife") and a few areas where the text jumps around a bit or isn't clear. The lead also currently doesn't cover the Traditional practices section. At a quick look through the body, the sourcing appears comprehensive, aside from two notes. There are other areas copyediting could be used for flow. "Bukit Brown Cemetery" does not need to be in every caption. Looks to be a decent selection of images. CMD (talk) 09:19, 16 October 2024 (UTC)

Hello, thanks for taking this up. Actuall7 (talk) 09:47, 16 October 2024 (UTC)
@Chipmunkdavis, I've edited the lead to include the Traditional practices section and changed some captions. Actuall7 (talk) 01:37, 17 October 2024 (UTC)
As noted above, the prose on this article needs work to meet GACR1a. Some examples:

"Originally owned by George Henry Brown, he purchased the land on hilly terrain and it became known as Brown's Hill, translated locally to Bukit Brown." This is joining together a few different ideas, and they have mixed a bit confusingly. It must have originally been owned by someone else. The terrain is a separate point to the purchase. The language could be specified instead of just saying "locally".
"After ownership for the land was passed around" is quite informal language.
"In 2011, the government designated the area for residential development which was met with backlash from activists and, in 2012, exhumed 3,700 graves to build an 8-lane highway" should be broken up into multiple fuller sentences.
"These are the main reasons by activists of why Bukit Brown Cemetery should be conserved" is missing some words.
Etymology has a similar run-on sentence about the initial purchase.
"Bukit Brown was also the first official location in Singapore to have an English and Malay name." Unclear what an "official location" is here, and the source describes it as a "hybrid Malay and English name", which has a very different meaning.
Some of the George Henry Brown information is duplicated across Etymology and History.
"He was known for his interest in music and played the organ at St. Andrew's Cathedral along with purchasing multiple plots of land" is another sentence grouping multiple unrelated ideas together.
"One such plot was land on a hill, which he called Mount Pleasant and built a cottage on it called Fern Cottage" is run-on sentence which should be split up.
"Brown sold the land to Mootapa Chitty, a Chettiar, and Lim Chu Yi who later sold the land to three Hokkien Seh Ong Kongsi clan members – Ong Hew Ko, Ong Ewe Hai, and Ong Chong Chew – who, in the 1870s, turned the land into a private cemetery for Chinese people of the Ong clan and became known as the Seh Ong Cemetery, managed by the Seh Ong Kongsi" is a very long sentence that should be broken up.
These are just examples, there is a need to go through the rest of the article as well. I have noticed an overuse of the word "also". The source I checked above for the English/Malay names also suggests that there may need to be further checking here. I am concerned rewriting and checking might take more than the weekish usually expected at GAN, and I do think it might be worth asking for a WP:GOCE check. Would you have thoughts on the timeline? CMD (talk) 09:34, 18 October 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for the feedback, regarding the timeline, I'm not too worried about how long it'll take. If you're busy, you can take your time, I'm not in a rush. Regarding the prose, I'll fix the problems addressed. Actuall7 (talk) 10:02, 18 October 2024 (UTC)
I am not planning to review the entire article in this way, the prose should ideally be fixed prior to review. CMD (talk) 10:49, 18 October 2024 (UTC)
Sorry, I was unaware that there were so many issues with the prose, don't hesitate to fail the article currently so that I can fix the issues regarding the prose. For what it's worth, I have edited the issues previously mentioned. If possible, do you have any other comments about the article so that I know what I should focus on? Actuall7 (talk) 11:17, 18 October 2024 (UTC)
Thanks for the response, and good luck with the article. Overall it looks quite decent and has a lot of interesting information. There is only one cemetery FA, Oakwood Cemetery (Troy, New York). Currently, this article seems broadly to cover the same topics as that article, and in some cases has a bit more, except for Geography. This could be a section explaining in more detail where the cemetery is, any internal structure to the way the graves are laid out, what is nearby to the cemetery on Mount Pleasant, and how the cemetery intersects with the MRT and road systems which caused parts of it to be damaged. Perhaps File:Aerial photography of Bukit Brown Cemetery.png would help in such a section. Aside from that I like the images. You may be able to ask the kind people at WP:Graphics lab if they can assist with the watermark on File:Chinese temple at Bukit Brown Cemetery.jpg. Best, CMD (talk) 11:48, 18 October 2024 (UTC)
Thanks for your comments, I'll make sure to fix these issues before I decide to submit it for GA again. Actuall7 (talk) 11:55, 18 October 2024 (UTC)


### Bukit Brown Cemetery
Hello, I'm listing this article for PR as I am interested in a future FA nom for it. This has been a passion project of mine for a while, and after passing a GAN in June, I would like extra eyes on it before committing to an FA nom. Thanks, – actuall7 (talk | contrib) 13:00, 28 October 2025 (UTC)


#### Icepinner
Glad to see this up on PR, Actuall7! Some comments from me: 

Is there an ISBN for Song 1923? At least for the book you've used.
I'm using this one from the Internet Archive, which doesn't seem to include an ISBN.
I think its Infopedia and Roots article can be put in the "External links" section
I've never been a fan of putting Infopedia links in the "External links" section as it's basically the Singaporean government's Wikipedia, along with the fact that the information in this particular Infopedia article is dated to 2013. Have added the Roots link.
This seems to be a good source.
Ah yes, I also found that source in my research, but I actually couldn't find any use of it in this article. I will probably add it in the future if I can think of a way to incorporate it.
Although not strictly required, ALT text for images is very much expected at FAC.
 Done
It seems like you're missing some ISSNs for ST (WP:CITEUNSEEN helps, though you still have to manually do it)
 Done
I wonder why Channel NewsAsia isn't italicised. It's a proper publication, no?
Personally, I tend to not italicise news websites such as CNA, unless you think it should be?
That's all I have for sourcing and images. Icepinner  11:32, 29 October 2025 (UTC)

Thanks for your comments Icepinner, have responded to them above. – actuall7 (talk | contrib) 02:39, 30 October 2025 (UTC)
Thanks Actuall. Regarding the italiscisation, I have italicised CNA in List of Singapore LRT stations, but idk, I don't think it's that big of an issue. Icepinner  11:20, 30 October 2025 (UTC)


#### CMD
Have made copyedits, please check.

"Kongsi" is a bit of jargon, ideally it can be clarified.
It should also be clarified what a "municipal cemetery" is, I think footnote [a] does this but it has space to be a bit more lengthy with a couple of sources, and perhaps added to other mentions of municipal cemetery.
"arrived in the Straits Settlements (present-day Singapore)", if it is known he arrived in Singapore specifically this can be reworded as "arrived in Singapore (then part of the Straits Settlements)", or if it is not known then it should be changed to "arrived in the Straits Settlements (which included present-day Singapore)"
"built a house he called Fern Cottage at Mount Pleasant", perhaps "on" Mount Pleasant if the source supports this
Was the site ever specifically known as Brown's Hill in English?
Someone with a good understanding of MOS:ITALIC will have to look at this page and the various discussions of names.
Was Mootapa Chitty a Chitty or is that a coincidence?
Are there dates or vague timeframes for when the transfers of title occurred?
Chinese people in Singapore is presumably not going to the intended location, although whether that needs changing in this article or a WP:RfD I am not sure.
"Hew Ko, Ewe Hai, and Chong Chew were buried at Bukit Brown Cemetery after their deaths". This sentence should be further developed to be clear if they are Seh Ong or Huay Kuan, and other further details which appear to be in that source.
"expansion efforts in Singapore", expansion of what?
"many suitable pieces of land", suitable for what?
"it was considered controversial by the Chinese community". Better to explain what this means more directly.
"The control of burial grounds were given to the Commission, as the Chinese community's views were considered more represented on that body than on the Council." The first part as currently written is  a little redundant, but rewriting should clarify whose understanding it is/was that the Chinese community's views were more heard by the Commission than the Council (the previous paragraph includes what sounds like an effective veto within the council).
"These restrictions led to private Chinese cemeteries becoming more prevalent, with a lack of public cemeteries for poorer Chinese labourers, who resorted to illegally dumping their dead, or non-Christian Chinese, as they could not bury at Christian cemeteries or private clan cemeteries." This could perhaps be broken down and elaborated upon a bit more.
"managed on the lines of the Christian Cemetery", is this quote referring to a specific Christian cemetery?
What happened to the 1904 proposal?
"Tan asked" where and who?
"he would manage", is "he" Tan or Song?
Seems to jump backwards a bit chronologically to go from Tan asking if Bukit Brown was ready to assessing what site would suit the cemetery.
"Due to the limited plot sizes, families tended to use two burial plots for one burial. Another complaint was the Commission's inconsistency in enforcing the layout rules; some graves took up two or more plots despite the fact that the by-laws required one grave per plot." A bit of redundancy here?
The "These changes..." paragraph has a few bits of what read like redundancy of some kind.
Not immediately clear in Geography whether the borders being referred to are of Greater Bukit Brown or of Bukit Brown cemetery. Is Bukit Brown still a place name outside of the cemetery?
Did the Pan Island Expressway go between Mount Pleasant cemetery and the rest of Bukit Brown cemetery? "Despite the fact that Mount Pleasant Cemetery is the same as Bukit Brown Cemetery" doesn't read quite right.
The "In November 2021..." sentence needs reworking.
What happened to the Mount Pleasant planning area?
What is the relation of Seh Ong Cemetery to the rest of Bukit Brown cemetery?
Link MacRitchie Reservoir?
"Graves at Bukit Brown Cemetery were built with a variety of materials from Europe and East Asia using traditional building techniques from the 1920s and 1930s." If they were built in the 1920s and 1930s, the techniques were not traditional from that time. They may have been traditional at that time.
CMD (talk) 11:51, 2 November 2025 (UTC)