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Transactions of the Senior Seminar
This page is a record of class proceedings in HIST 489 during fall term 2007. Transactions are arranged from most recent to most distant.
17 October
- Dr. Isern talked about introductions, and the two techniques of how to write an introduction.
- He also set some deadlines :
Get an introduction written and sent to him by noon on Wednesday (10/24)
Get an outline up by Friday
And get those Bibs started
He also mentioned the Colloquium on Friday at 3PM.
Everyone gave a brief description of how there research was coming, and what they have been doing for research. No major snags were reported.
- Submitted by Matt Boe
3 October
-Chloe Quirk discussed the progress she's made on her Ringling Bros. monument research.
-Research done at the Courthouse can yield useful results in the form of marriage records, divorce records, probate records, etc.
-Kurt Easterday discussed the progress he's made on his Abraham Lincoln monument research
-Mark Popp discussed the progress he's made on his Statue of Liberty replica monument progress, including the fact that the arm and torch had at one time fallen off, was stolen, and had to be replaced.
-Adam Pool discussed the progress he's made on his Budd Reeves monument research.
-An obituary of someone has potential to shed some light on their personality.
-Matt Spielman discussed the progress he's made on his Grand Army of the Republic monument research.
-Josh Eslinger discussed the progress he's made on his Spanish-American War monument research.
-State legislature records are a good source for investigating the "who" and "why" aspects of why a monument was built.
-Matt Boe discussed the progress he's made on his Noble's Golden Margaurite monument research, including the fact that he cannot find the current location of the Golden Margaurite.
-Kelly Hansen discussed the progress he's made on his Nicolett Tower monument research, and inquired about the availability of a video produced about his monument.
-Throughout the discussion of everybody's monument research, Dr. Isern offered advice that would be helpful in everybody's respective research.
-For next time, everybody was asked to continue their research.
-Submitted by Kelly Hansen
19 September -Reminder on book reviews. Try to get the final copy sent to Isern attached to an email. -Check out specifications for prospectus. Link: http://www.ndsu.edu/instruct/isern/489/prospectus.htm. Link to your page on Wiki by Tuesday September 25.
-Tips for primary research;
-Create your bibliography in Wiki
-Josh Eslinger reported on Burke
-Historians need to be concerned with memory from 2 different points of view. 1.study of memory as an historical source. & 2. concerned with memory as a historical phenomenon-noting that memory is selective (pg 46)
-3 main questions 1. What are the modes of transmission of public memories & how have they changed over time?; 2. What are the uses of these memories and how have they changed over time?; 3. What are the uses of oblivion..."Social amnesia"
-Transmission of Social Memory--oral, memoirs and other written "records," images (ex. monuments), ritual actions, space ("placing of images"(pg47)
-Uses of Social Memory--Why do some cultures seem to be more concerned with recalling their past than others? Example of short social memories of English and Americans and long of Irish and Polish. Victors can afford to forget. The "losers" keep thinking about the event, what they could have done differently, and how to get revenge. They end up remembering it longer and more clearly than the victors. (pg54)
-Uses of Social Amnesia--official censorship of embarrassing memories--myths not to be despised, but reading them literally is not to be recommended
-in conclusion "I prefer to see historians as the guardians of the skeletons in the cupboard of social memory" (pg 59)
--Notes on Burke article submitted by Josh Eslinger
-Kurt Easterday reported on Kammen
-Submitted,Adam Pool
12 September
6 September - Class on 5 September
-Get your book review done ASAP.
-If you have your book, have your review done by Monday, 10 September.
-If you don't have your book, get the review done by end of the week of 10 Sept.
-You should attach the Word Document to an e-mail to Dr. Isern.
-After you send it, e-mail Dr. Isern with your interview time.
-Make sure you double space the entire review, including the heading.
-Claim your topic by Friday
-Go to America History and Life, search for historical monuments, statues, other.
-Find an article to add to the bibliography and write a couple of sentences for a summary.
-Always use the Chicago Manual of Style and Oxford English Dictionary.
Some books to help with writing include:
-The Elements of Style by E.B White and Strunk. (The little blue book).
-The Little Brown Book by Fowler
-The Rhetoric of History
-Discussion about the readings included
E.H. Carr (Lindsey Hillmer)
-No objective historical truth.
-Unending dialog with the past.
-Historians give history meaning with the facts they decide to use.
-You need to think of the time when things were written.
-What is history? - This question must be asked.
Becker (Matt Spielman)
-Reduce history to its lowest terms (find an idea).
-Simpler is easier to understand.
-2 histories: one is what actually happened, the second is how it was/is remembered and/or seen, talked about.
-Everyone in the world is a historian.
-The memory of things said and done.
-Next weeks readings:
-William McNeill: Adam Pool
-Joyce Appleby: Chloe Quirk
-For our papers, use sources from:
-the monument itself, interviews, records, interactions and present day knowledge, secondary sources.
-Use imagination for your sources.
-Go to the past and follow the documents forward.
-Submitted, Kurt Easterday
29 August
-Discussed Herodotus-keep writing in 3rd Person on site (profile in 1st Person)
-check out Hardhat History & site for Center for Heritage Renewal
-Readings
1. Webb, “The Historical Seminar” --Matt Boe
-both instructors & students are learning throughout process-a growing experience
-Outer shell-methods, bibliography, writing
-Spirit-desire to do the research & writing –the “amateur” –the idea “framing”
-point students in right direction
-Webb-seminar helps students to develop their own interests-extends knowledge
-Webb-establish something like a chemistry lab for historians (idea from Ranke)
-Is History objective or subjective?
-objective- establishment of facts –similar to court cases
-subjective-what facts are used and interpretation of those facts
- “dangerous historians” –selecting certain facts, using bias facts, not being critical of sources
2. Von Humbolt, “On the Historian’s Task” -Kelly
-what History is and is not
-historian vs. drafter
-History vs. Philosophy –no biases in History –what really happened
-sometimes countered himself –“accurately” as opposed to using “intuition”
-what really happened as opposed to “the gist of it”
-need for an idea –concept, theme,… for the seminar
-learn the secondary literature, but don’t get captured by those interpretations
-inductive reasoning-get the facts and see if you can find/see patterns
-Assigned next readings --Carr –Lindsey
--Becker –Matt Spielman
-check out calendar –pay attention to due dates
-Book Reviews –Due Monday, September 10
-used to guide each other
-length 500 WORDS
-specifications http://www.ndsu.edu/instruct/isern/489/review.htm
-summary of strengths and weaknesses
-keep in mind audience –what are the interpretive ideas useful to other students?
-use correct heading and signature
-Paper topics
-list of topics posted online
-use announcements page to claim a monument
-for journal articles use “America: History and Life” –search historical monuments, collective memory, statues, etc.
**find articles and add to bibliography** –added by name
22 August (Suzanne Brossart)
-The class filled out an assessment.
-The theme for this semester's Senior Seminar is Monumental History.
-The class discussed the difference between a professional and an amateur.
-The class is to look up specifications for the paper on the Senior Seminar homepage.
-Please get yourself activated and a member of Herodutus. Look up Herodutus and see who he was. Set up a page for yourself. Template: homepage for your name, save as a page in wiki and put a biography of yourself on your homepage.
-For tips on writing about history look at hard hat history on the Senior Seminar homepage.
-Reserved readings can also be found on the Senior Seminar homepage. Students will be asked each week to report on what he or she read. This week Matt will be telling the main ideas of the Web reading, and Kelly will report on the Humboldt reading.
-The username for the reserved readings is seminar, the password is student.
-Take a look at the Center for Heritage Renewal homepage.
5 September
Here write minutes & notes of the class session
12 September
Here write minutes & notes of the class session
19 September
And so on. . . .
17 October
- Dr. Isern talked about introductions, and the two techniques of how to write an introduction.
- He also set some deadlines :
Get an introduction written and sent to him by noon on Wednesday (10/24)
Get an outline up by Friday
And get those Bibs started
He also mentioned the Colloquium on Friday at 3PM.
Everyone gave a brief description of how there research was coming, and what they have been doing for research. No major snags were reported.
- Submitted by Matt Boe
3 October
-Chloe Quirk discussed the progress she's made on her Ringling Bros. monument research.
-Research done at the Courthouse can yield useful results in the form of marriage records, divorce records, probate records, etc.
-Kurt Easterday discussed the progress he's made on his Abraham Lincoln monument research
-Mark Popp discussed the progress he's made on his Statue of Liberty replica monument progress, including the fact that the arm and torch had at one time fallen off, was stolen, and had to be replaced.
-Adam Pool discussed the progress he's made on his Budd Reeves monument research.
-An obituary of someone has potential to shed some light on their personality.
-Matt Spielman discussed the progress he's made on his Grand Army of the Republic monument research.
-Josh Eslinger discussed the progress he's made on his Spanish-American War monument research.
-State legislature records are a good source for investigating the "who" and "why" aspects of why a monument was built.
-Matt Boe discussed the progress he's made on his Noble's Golden Margaurite monument research, including the fact that he cannot find the current location of the Golden Margaurite.
-Kelly Hansen discussed the progress he's made on his Nicolett Tower monument research, and inquired about the availability of a video produced about his monument.
-Throughout the discussion of everybody's monument research, Dr. Isern offered advice that would be helpful in everybody's respective research.
-For next time, everybody was asked to continue their research.
-Submitted by Kelly Hansen
19 September -Reminder on book reviews. Try to get the final copy sent to Isern attached to an email. -Check out specifications for prospectus. Link: http://www.ndsu.edu/instruct/isern/489/prospectus.htm. Link to your page on Wiki by Tuesday September 25.
-Tips for primary research;
- Follow the memory group
- Word of Mouth. What is the locale's memory, and what do they think of the monument?
- Newspaper coverage at the time.
- Possibilities of living family members.
- Ancestry Library, access on campus. http://ancestrylibrary.proquest.com/aleweb/ale/do/login
- Local historical societies.
- Site visit document. http://www.ndsu.edu/instruct/isern/489/monuments/site.doc
- GPS unit available from Jack Jackson in the History department.
- Digital cameras at ITS
- more pictures the better!
- several angles and surroundings
- If possible shoot short clip of video
- Sketch of site in Notebook
-Create your bibliography in Wiki
-Josh Eslinger reported on Burke
-Historians need to be concerned with memory from 2 different points of view. 1.study of memory as an historical source. & 2. concerned with memory as a historical phenomenon-noting that memory is selective (pg 46)
-3 main questions 1. What are the modes of transmission of public memories & how have they changed over time?; 2. What are the uses of these memories and how have they changed over time?; 3. What are the uses of oblivion..."Social amnesia"
-Transmission of Social Memory--oral, memoirs and other written "records," images (ex. monuments), ritual actions, space ("placing of images"(pg47)
-Uses of Social Memory--Why do some cultures seem to be more concerned with recalling their past than others? Example of short social memories of English and Americans and long of Irish and Polish. Victors can afford to forget. The "losers" keep thinking about the event, what they could have done differently, and how to get revenge. They end up remembering it longer and more clearly than the victors. (pg54)
-Uses of Social Amnesia--official censorship of embarrassing memories--myths not to be despised, but reading them literally is not to be recommended
-in conclusion "I prefer to see historians as the guardians of the skeletons in the cupboard of social memory" (pg 59)
--Notes on Burke article submitted by Josh Eslinger
-Kurt Easterday reported on Kammen
-Submitted,Adam Pool
12 September
For next time
-keep expanding the secondary source bibliography
-get started on primary research for your monument. Go to the Institute for Regional Studies within the next week or so. Don't forget to sign in.
-Add to primary source list.
-Get book review done and schedule appt. for a meeting.
-Report on Burke-Josh Eslinger
-Report on Kammen-Kurt Easterday
Minutes
-Everyone has a topic picked.
-Colloqui lectures, first one is Sept. 21 @ Morrill 107.
-Report on McNeill by Adam Pool
-"myths" are explanations of the way things are and the term is interchangable w/ history. it really all depends on the perspectve.
-facts usually don't go against popular sentiment
-all human groups like to be flattered. so think about your memory group.
-McNeill not as concerned w/ the absolute truth.
-scientific backing is required.
-Report on Appleby by Chloe Quirk
-social history is more popular recently, as it includes the study of ordinary people who can substitute for an entire event or group.
-history is not a science, because language cannot accurately represent the past. this view of ambiguity is one of postmodernism, and has led to a greater freedom of interpretation among historians.
-"Epistomology"-how you know what you know
-Historians need to let the public know their methods and what they are doing in order to maintain credibility.
-Historians need to have empathy for people in the past... in other words, try and see things from their perspective.
--mark popp
6 September - Class on 5 September
-Get your book review done ASAP.
-If you have your book, have your review done by Monday, 10 September.
-If you don't have your book, get the review done by end of the week of 10 Sept.
-You should attach the Word Document to an e-mail to Dr. Isern.
-After you send it, e-mail Dr. Isern with your interview time.
-Make sure you double space the entire review, including the heading.
-Claim your topic by Friday
-Go to America History and Life, search for historical monuments, statues, other.
-Find an article to add to the bibliography and write a couple of sentences for a summary.
-Always use the Chicago Manual of Style and Oxford English Dictionary.
Some books to help with writing include:
-The Elements of Style by E.B White and Strunk. (The little blue book).
-The Little Brown Book by Fowler
-The Rhetoric of History
-Discussion about the readings included
E.H. Carr (Lindsey Hillmer)
-No objective historical truth.
-Unending dialog with the past.
-Historians give history meaning with the facts they decide to use.
-You need to think of the time when things were written.
-What is history? - This question must be asked.
Becker (Matt Spielman)
-Reduce history to its lowest terms (find an idea).
-Simpler is easier to understand.
-2 histories: one is what actually happened, the second is how it was/is remembered and/or seen, talked about.
-Everyone in the world is a historian.
-The memory of things said and done.
-Next weeks readings:
-William McNeill: Adam Pool
-Joyce Appleby: Chloe Quirk
-For our papers, use sources from:
-the monument itself, interviews, records, interactions and present day knowledge, secondary sources.
-Use imagination for your sources.
-Go to the past and follow the documents forward.
-Submitted, Kurt Easterday
29 August
-Discussed Herodotus-keep writing in 3rd Person on site (profile in 1st Person)
-check out Hardhat History & site for Center for Heritage Renewal
-Readings
1. Webb, “The Historical Seminar” --Matt Boe
-both instructors & students are learning throughout process-a growing experience
-Outer shell-methods, bibliography, writing
-Spirit-desire to do the research & writing –the “amateur” –the idea “framing”
-point students in right direction
-Webb-seminar helps students to develop their own interests-extends knowledge
-Webb-establish something like a chemistry lab for historians (idea from Ranke)
-Is History objective or subjective?
-objective- establishment of facts –similar to court cases
-subjective-what facts are used and interpretation of those facts
- “dangerous historians” –selecting certain facts, using bias facts, not being critical of sources
2. Von Humbolt, “On the Historian’s Task” -Kelly
-what History is and is not
-historian vs. drafter
-History vs. Philosophy –no biases in History –what really happened
-sometimes countered himself –“accurately” as opposed to using “intuition”
-what really happened as opposed to “the gist of it”
-need for an idea –concept, theme,… for the seminar
-learn the secondary literature, but don’t get captured by those interpretations
-inductive reasoning-get the facts and see if you can find/see patterns
-Assigned next readings --Carr –Lindsey
--Becker –Matt Spielman
-check out calendar –pay attention to due dates
-Book Reviews –Due Monday, September 10
-used to guide each other
-length 500 WORDS
-specifications http://www.ndsu.edu/instruct/isern/489/review.htm
-summary of strengths and weaknesses
-keep in mind audience –what are the interpretive ideas useful to other students?
-use correct heading and signature
-Paper topics
-list of topics posted online
-use announcements page to claim a monument
-for journal articles use “America: History and Life” –search historical monuments, collective memory, statues, etc.
**find articles and add to bibliography** –added by name
22 August (Suzanne Brossart)
-The class filled out an assessment.
-The theme for this semester's Senior Seminar is Monumental History.
-The class discussed the difference between a professional and an amateur.
-The class is to look up specifications for the paper on the Senior Seminar homepage.
-Please get yourself activated and a member of Herodutus. Look up Herodutus and see who he was. Set up a page for yourself. Template: homepage for your name, save as a page in wiki and put a biography of yourself on your homepage.
-For tips on writing about history look at hard hat history on the Senior Seminar homepage.
-Reserved readings can also be found on the Senior Seminar homepage. Students will be asked each week to report on what he or she read. This week Matt will be telling the main ideas of the Web reading, and Kelly will report on the Humboldt reading.
-The username for the reserved readings is seminar, the password is student.
-Take a look at the Center for Heritage Renewal homepage.
5 September
Here write minutes & notes of the class session
12 September
Here write minutes & notes of the class session
19 September
And so on. . . .
Latest page update: made by Matt_Boe
, Oct 18 2007, 5:49 PM EDT
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87 words added
view changes
- complete history)
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