Blog 7: Thesis Progress Over Intercession

Over intercession my plan of work includes the following schedule below:

Plan of Work 
Week of Dec 19th
• Fix suggested changes from the review of Muse Faculty and Advisers
Week of Dec 26th
• Continue research on digitizing bound books
• Research papier-mâché books
Week of Jan 2nd
• Continue research on cradles and how to make them
• Continue conversation with Dr. Galbraith about how to treat the book during the 3D scanning process and if they already have a cradle that can work
Week of Jan 9th
• Research alternative places to 3D print on RIT’s campus just in case the filament at the Construct does not provide a high enough resolution
Week of Jan 16th
• Edit Intro and first body paragraph
• Contact Mike before the start of the semester to schedule some time to come to the archive during early Spring Semester
Week of Jan 23rd (week 1 of Spring Semester)
• Make sure that the proposal, intro, and research are completed before the first day of class

My goal is not to abandon this project during the course of the break and leave everything to the last moment before the first day of school. My plan is to allocate at least two days a week to each bullet point. My goals include to edit the parts of my thesis that already exist, research papier-mâché books and create a work schedule that will orchestrate all the people involved in my thesis. One circumstance that might hinder weekly progress is my possible internship at Kodak; however, I am still able to work on my thesis at night as well as during the weekends. I do not doubt that I will make progress this intercession and I can't wait to experiment next semester.

What I've Learned In Class So Far

To read and write theses, a solid foundation must be formed. Luckily, for RIT students in the Museum Studies program, the Research Methods class does just that. While we finalize our thesis ideas, read papers for research and learning how to navigate databases, the first weeks of class consisted of how to read and dissect scholarly articles into important parts to know when building a thesis. These parts include Research Questions, Research Methodologies, Evidence presented, Conclusions,

Structures and Citations. These categories are important to reading and analyzing research papers becasue it perfectly sums up the core information presented in the article. Later when writing my own thesis, I can use these to look back on and use as evidence. 

Aside from the research presented in each of the articles, they also exhibit ways in which we can research and write our own. For example, the article “Preserving the Voices of Revolution: Examining the Creation and Preservation of a Subject-Centered Collection of Tweets from the Eighteen Days in Egypt” details step by step how to preserve born digital media which would be a good source for my thesis that is based upon digitization. Detailing how to digitize manuscripts or 3D objects could be one focus of my thesis. On another note, a thesis can be written about public history, such as Kelly's thesis, and could use the article "I Know I’m Home When I Have One:’ The Cultural Significance of the Garbage Plate of Rochester, NY" as a framework. Surveying the community about the panel can be one focus of her thesis. For now, I will continue my research with the help of zotero which was another helpful research tool I learned through this class. 

Bibliography: 

Timothy Arnold and Walker Sampson, “Preserving the Voices of Revolution: Examining the Creation and Preservation of a Subject-Centered Collection of Tweets from the Eighteen Days in Egypt,” The American Archivist, Vol. 77, No. 2, pp. 510-533 (Fall/Winter 2014).

Emily Fekete, “‘I Know I’m Home When I Have One:’ The Cultural Significance of the Garbage Plate of Rochester, NY,” Material Culture, Vol 46, No. 1, pp. 25-43 (2014).