The Home Stretch

Draft two submitted! Processing the feedback was definitely difficult, but it has greatly helped in fleshing out my literature review. My section on DeafSpace is mostly done, though I would like to expand on it a bit more before I submit my thesis. The sections left to write are my case study, its interpretation, and the conclusion! Now is just time to get cracking, with periodic breaks to design my poster. I'm most excited to get that finished, I'm looking forward to sharing my work with others.

Draft 2 Complete :)

I submitted my second draft yesterday! It's really shocking to me how far I've come whenever I open the document and see how long it is haha. I'm very proud of the progress I've made and it's hard to believe that the semester is halfway over and that I'm so close to finishing my thesis. We started working on posters yesterday too which I think will be a lot of fun because I really love design, so I'm excited to see how it comes out! 

I can see the finish line!

 Hello all! I am super excited to announce that my project worked! I implemented my indoor navigation model at the RMSC, and all seemed to work out just fine! I am really looking forward to making the last couple of touchups on my thesis, and getting it done by April 9th! The finish line is in sight! 

Still Chugging Along

I thought my blog post was published yesterday but it did not! So here is an additional submissions on 2/7. 

Since turning in the first draft last week, I have had a lot of time to think about what else I need to add to make my thesis stronger. While writing my draft, I realized it would be beneficial to have a section added that talked about migratory farming and farmers from Central and South America. I realized this after thinking about the Clarissa Uprooted project and how there are similaries there. I will be spending a lot of time doing more research into this section in regard to both primary and secondary sources. I also have my first interview with the former mayor of Winchester, Virginia who helped run the festival for many years and had many different roles in the planning. I am very excited to talk with him and hear his memories and stories. I will be basing our conversation on the questions Landyn Hatch and Dr. Carroll have both looked over. I also found some great pictures of myself in the Grand Feature Parade that I will attach here and look into adding to my thesis figures as well. 

First Draft Completed and Data Curation: James Falotico

 Hello, welcome back to another update of my thesis and project. Since my last update, I have accomplished quite a lot. First, I held a reception for my exhibition and gave visitors access to an exit survey so I could start curating data for my thesis. So far, I have received 65 completed surveys, and I am now digging through the data from the study and organizing it in a way usable in my thesis. To give a small window into the data I collected, the object that captured the audience's attention the most was a poster titled Save Waste Fats For Explosives (I have included an image below). The poster motif that stood out the most to the public is The Enemy (I have included a picture of a poster that displays the enemy below). Moving away from the exhibit side of my project, I have also reached out to Jessy Ohl from the University of Alabama and have received the website traffic data from his online exhibit Persuasive Weapons: WWI Propaganda Posters, which I will soon analyze to find visitor patterns and measure visitor engagement. Finally, I have completed and sent out the first draft of my thesis to my thesis advisors, and I look forward to reading their feedback. 

Link to Jessy Ohl's online Exhibit: https://apps.lib.ua.edu/blogs/worldwariposters/     

Save Waste Fats for Explosives

An example of a poster that displays the motif of the Enemy.

Hun or Home?

Drafting & Discovering!

 As my comrades have already detailed, last week marked the first opportunity to produce a draft of our theses beyond a proposal. I used this time to re-evaluate the state of af-fairs (ha) of Renn Faires in the United States, and select those which I intend to use as "cases" for my argument! 

Initially, I had planned to use my "home" Faire, the Pennsylvania Renaissance Faire, as well as the New York Renaissance Fair (closest to RIT) for case studies as a subcomponent of my thesis paper. A quick search of events in the US, however, turned up some interesting data. I had known that the oldest Faire in the US (considered to be the first ever anywhere, and the blueprint for Faires to come) is the Renaissance Pleasure Faire in California, inaugurated in 1962. What I didn't know, however, was that that was just the tip of the iceberg. 

Some fun facts and figures for you*:

• The Texas Renaissance Festival pulls in the highest yearly attendance of 500,000-600,000 guests!
• The Colorado Renaissance Fair has the largest physical space, clocking in at 338 acres!
• Pennsylvania (though my personal favorite of course) rests in the middle of the pack, founded in 1980 as a publicity stunt that turned wildly popular and now pulls in around 250,000 visitors yearly.

With all of this information, I changed my initial plans and have settled on a trifecta of the Renaissance Pleasure Faire, Texas Renn Fest, and PA Renn Faire as my case studies. These events really run the gamut of what Faires have to offer, and I have been dutifully researching them each as a valuable foundation for my project. 

To summarize: My first draft arrives at the intersection of exciting things, and I can't wait to use this information I've been gathering to better my work. Long live the Faire!

*Information accessed & summarized via Wikipedia; corroborated by each Faire's official website.

1st Draft and Moving Along

It was exciting to turn in the first draft of the semester (even though I had a bit of a computer nightmare and couldn't access pieces of it). I'm working on my item case studies now and that's going well. I have 5 objects I have decided to definitely use and another 5 that I am pretty sure I am going to use. I am busy compiling research on those. I'm trying to remind myself to just get all the information and research down and that I don't have to make everything perfect right at this time. Writing in "draft" is hard for me but I'm trying to focus on that vs every case study must be in complete "turn-in-able" form. It's best for me to get it all out there and refine a bit down the road. I'm heading to the GCV&M on Monday to do some research in the library. Since I just redid that library last semester, I know a few books that will be helpful in some of the case study research. Things are moving along but I feel like I need to pick up the pace now. I have to say I will be pretty excited to be finished!

First Draft of Thesis is Complete

 So this post is a bit late, I apologize for that! But last week- January 30th 2024, we turned in our rough drafts for our thesis topics. I knew if I tried to write this draft out all in one go, I was going to end up hating my topic and never want to look at the draft again. So, this time for probably one of the first times in my college career I set aside time in each day for about a week and a half to work on the draft. My goals were for one day to do further research on a section within the thesis, then the next day implement all the information from those sources into the section I was currently writing. I did this for about three sections that I wanted to be my core, and which left me room to add sections if need be.

As of right now my thesis went a bit away from where I originally thought it was gonna go, but I’m not mad about it. In fact I quite like the direction it is going in. I cannot wait to see how my peers have progressed in their work as well! 

First Drafts and Imposter Syndrome

 Well, it's becoming real to me. Last week (1/30) we submitted official First Drafts of our theses. As I was looking over the cover page the Saturday prior I stopped and just stared at my monitor in awe... and my heart skipped a couple of beats. It's actually happening... or, one might say "sh-- just got real!" Somewhat as I joke I've continued mentioning my countdown (though I've chosen to not feature it in my blog post titles, just in case it might cause additional anxiety for my peers), but something about seeing that officially formatted cover page, with the title of my thesis, and with my name on it, and the final submission date... I had some minor fireworks going off in my mind there for a moment. 

I had a lot of opportunity to talk about my project with various friends and co-workers from my part-time job; and the owners of the Bird House were both excited for me and tossing out ideas about me making presentations at the store or to birding groups in the area, and the excitement and ocean of possibilities loomed wide and vast...

Fast forward to me looking at myself in the mirror this morning; thinking about my project and where I'd like it to go and how it would be useful and/or appealing for different target audiences, and I suddenly asked myself, "who the heck do I think I am, how am I any kind of authority to be attempting something like this?" I'm not a linguist. I'm not an educator. I'm not a historian. I'm not an ornithologist. I'm not an anthropologist. I'm not even indigenous to this continent (or so says Ancestry.com). What gives me any kind of authority or credibility to produce what will amount to an English / Seneca Dictionary and Reference Guide? In that moment, I began to doubt the validity of my project, the acceptance of my project, and my perception of self. 

As I continued getting ready for work, the doubts became more muffled and easier to ignore. Besides, that negative inner voice doesn't have it quite right... with the successful completion of my academic requirements and acceptance of my thesis and poster; I will be a Museum Studies graduate engaging in a Public History initiative, which is in line with my professional track. And, while not an ornithologist, I am accomplished in the observation and photographing of birds in urban and natural environments - and for the areas in which I'm lacking credentials or expertise or experience I am seeking collaborations with those who are authorities in the manner; or can rightfully speak to the material, words, and content in question. 

Get thee behind me, Inner Voice of negativity... because I still have a lot of work to do and no time to be distracted by you. 

96 Days. 

First Milestone of the Semester

 With our first draft submitted I am feeling really confident and successful. Getting started with the actual thesis writing aside from our proposals really intimidated me at first and I'm proud of myself for doing it. I chose to start with the most difficult portion of my thesis, informal learning basics and such, instead of leaving it to the end like I originally planned and I'm glad I did that. Hopefully, it will avoid future stress when we get down to the wire. I'm eager to receive feedback from my readers and start revising and adding. 😸