So after a couple weeks of confusion, frustration, and searching I can comfortably say that I now have something new to write about regarding our class’s final project. I found myself debating for the last few weeks on what I wanted my final project to entail and after sitting in on a meeting for the Scottish Chapbooks project I found my decision to be even harder. While I was excited to create my own digital humanities project I was very intrigued by the Chapbooks project and what it had to offer not only me, but others as well. I knew I would be learning a fair bit about Scottish History (something which I don’t know much about) and I would still have the opportunity to use many different tools and methods which I previously had very little, or no experience of. Also the idea of being part of the beginnings of something which potentially could continue to grow long after I’m graduated intrigued me quite a bit. After coming to these realizations the decision to choose the Chapbooks project was much easier.
Over the last few days I have scoured through the online directory of chapbooks that are held in the Guelph Archives looking for some sort of pattern. I wanted to be able to take a number of articles and be able to compare, contrast, and essentially analyze them. What I discovered after getting to the bottom of the list was that there were a number of categories to choose from. I could look at chapbooks discussing domestic life. I could look at religious pieces, or collections of songs (something which probably makes up over half of the collection). There were a number of chapbooks which looked at battle histories, “true stories”, and biographical life and death stories of a number of different members of royalty. While all of these options were very interesting, and had loads of potential, I eventually settled on focusing of chapbooks that focused on comics and comedic stories. Humour is something that is timeless and I am looking forward to seeing what is contained in these chapbooks and what 18th and 19th century Scotland considered to be humour.
This morning a few available members of the chapbooks group met with Melissa McAfee who is the Special Collections Librarian at the University and is heading this project. I feel like we all were able to grasp a better understanding of what is expected from our research and what the final project should essentially look like. While I have no doubt that problems will continue to arise, and more questions will be needing answered by all involved, I am confident that we are all currently on the same page and on the right track to the completion of this project.
Nate's HIST*4170 Blog 