Week 7

 This week there is not much to report on. We are continuing to comb through the sources we have and even search for some new primary sources to use. This week I have been focusing on continuing to work through primary sources. However, this week we have talked about working on a system to allow us to better keep track of who is doing what. David and I have discussed how we wanted to split the work left to do. It would be good to get a clearer picture of where we are in our work, which would be the primary goal of the system. Doctor Gannon has a system she uses for other projects using Excel spreadsheets. Next week, we will go over this in-depth. 

Since we discussed the organization, I decided I should organize the work I have done so far. While I have my system that I started a few weeks back. I don’t always remember while I am working. Doctor Gannon recommended we write notes on the sources we look at and put them in a word document. I have been keeping up with physical note writing. I prefer writing physically since I find it helps me remember and focus. However, I ended up noting on a word document for some sources. So have put my notes from paper to a collective word document. Along with moving ahead with more sources, I have been putting a focus on moving my work into one place. 

For the past two weeks, we have been discussing the language of what we write. The goal remains to bring attention to the forgotten men at Olustee. It seems simple, and we have already come up with the tone we want to set. I simply thought about it and how I wasn’t sure what words would be the right ones. It feels like an odd hangup to have. I have been writing about so many other subjects that I find just as important and care about. I suppose the difference in this is that this is not something I am turning into a professor. This internship is about pushing my comfort zone and learning the inner workings of public history projects. I suppose public academic writing is more out of my comfort zone more than I expected. I look forward to continuing our work. Next week, we will work on how we will document and share our progress with each other. We discuss this at the beginning of every meeting, but I look forward to having a visual of our progress. 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Week 1

Hello! My name is Abigail Geraci. I am an undergrad student at the University of Central Florida and will graduate this semester. I started my college adventure at Seminole State College, where I got my associate degree as a Psychology major. It was after my first year at UCF that I made the switch to History. Psychology is still of interest, but I found that I enjoyed history more. Now, after two years in the history program, I am about to graduate. It’s been such a rewarding experience, not to mention fun. I am excited to work in the field and eventually going for a master’s degree. Like many others in the historical field, I do have my favorite areas of study. I have always had an interest in Ancient Egypt. Starting back when I was in elementary school and did my first presentation on the Pharaoh Hatshepsut. It remains one of my favorite subjects to read on, especially their daily lives. After taking German as my foreign language, it sparked my interest in German history. With this
Read more

Week 12

 We are coming up on the last month of this internship, along with my last month of my bachelor's degree. As we have been working these past few months, we have been making slow progress on the various tasks I have talked about in past posts. However, I believe it's better at taking our time rather than rushing. We are nearing the end now and wrapping up the work we have been doing. There is not much new to report on that front since we are simply continuing and finishing what we have been doing. We have pushed our web design workshop back to next week. I am still looking forward to learning more about web design. It also marks the end of our work on this project. I am looking forward to taking these skills onward into the next stage of my life and further into grad school. Overall, I am grateful for this experience. On the Olustee front, I have submitted one of the group's works to Doctor Gannon for review, including the new context we added. So I spent some time over the
Read more

Week 3

Week three is coming to a close. This week our work has focused on combing through the materials that our classmates gathered last semester. Mainly we are focusing on making sure we write it in an active voice, the sources are reliable, then finally checking grammar. Writing has been a focus, especially in the classes I took last semester. My professors focused more on honing the writing skills we already have. Active vs. Passive is an important change. Active voice gives a clearer and stronger tone to your writing, and therefore should be the voice you are using in your papers. Changing any passive verbs to active verbs will give a better tone to the message we are trying to spread.  Because of this focus, it is not the first time I have combed through work and changed it from passive to active. Doctor Gannon has always pushed us to make this a habit and bring this thinking to the forefront of our writing. Changing the passive verbs to active isn’t always as simple as changing a word,
Read more