History (and related) Podcasts!

• BackStory with the American History Guys
• Ben Franklin's World
• History of English Podcast
• History Extra
• Myths and Legends
• New Books in American Studies
• New Books in Anthropology
• New Books in Biography
• New Books in Critical Theory
• New Books in Gender Studies
• New Books in History
• New Books in Intellectual History
• New Books in Native American Studies
• Office Hours
• Philosophize This!
• Stuff You Missed in History Class
• The Bowery Boys: NYC History
• The History Chicks
• The Pamphlet
• The Way of Improvement Leads Home
• Who Makes Cents | A History of Capitalism Podcast

Okay, but what the heck do I do with all these research notes?!?!

- me, for months.

I've tried a wiki, which, though it doesn't quite work for the note taking/collecting stage that I'm currently struggling with, I do generally like and will still probably be using further down my workflow pipeline (that is, unless I find a Heurist database more helpful than a straight up wiki for that stage, as this week I've been experimenting with that).

After realizing that it wasn't quite the thing for this stage of the research, I shifted over to Scrivener, where I first basically copied the format of a wiki page with each section getting it's own text (page/note), but allowing for more unstructured info and quotes, etc. But that still wasn't quite what I needed (duh, I say retrospectively.)

Then I found the idea of conceptual matrices (yes I spelled it wrong in Scrivener) that seem to work so well for things that aren't biographical research... I tried those, continuously having to break them down so each page wasn't getting so unwieldy, and so here I am now, with this total mess:

 

#REGRET

So, I've spent waaaay too much time the last couple of days trying to figure out what to do, looking into various possibilities (I do NOT understand how people use Evernote for this, I would simply DIE of overwhelm) (and TiddlyWiki sounded promising, but was super confusing and I gave up on that, too.)

Sooooo, what did I end up with after all this searching?

Why, the very system I was trying so hard to find a digital alternative for, of course!

Index Cards.

Credit goes to Ryan Holiday's Thought Catalog article The Notecard System: The Key For Remembering, Organizing And Using Everything You Read, in which he explains that index cards were:

"... responsible for helping me publish three books in three years, (along with other books I’ve had the privilege of contributing to), write countless articles published in newspapers and websites, send out my reading recommendations every month, and make all sorts of other work and personal successes possible."

Uh, yes please. I would like to have anything approaching that level of productivity!
Okay, okay. I should use the notecard system. But of course I then spent half a day trying to find an explicitly digital-index-card system (Scrivener's not counting bc I need a bazillion cards) because, trees! Hand cramping! Supply costs! Travel! Etc!

NoodleTools, though aimed at k-12 students, seemed pretty close, but then I just gave up. I don't want all my notes in such a closed system, anyway. I should just use the actual, physical cards.

So, I can't afford a printer to just print & paste things onto the cards, and my hand is already aching at the thought of what's to come, but I  know darn well that this is the best possible system that currently exists that works best for my brain.

My brain is weird, you see (I have severe ADHD..) and I really do work better with physical copies of things, though my millennial self generally prefers that which is digital and techie. But, ADHD brains in particular really do need things, especially information, to be "externalized" and physically manipulatable (our working memory is crap).

In fact, I thought to write this post after reading this article by fellow ADHDer Aimée Morrison at Hook & Eye this morning, in which she describes why she uses paper for research notes, which is the same reason physical copies work best for me, too:

For me, paper is visible in very important ways: scale, scope, the gist. How much progress I’m making, how much I have left. Where the holes are, sometimes literally. Paper is a massive memory aid, an externalization of my working memory, all the more crucial the larger or more complex a task becomes. Colour coded sticky notes and pens and paper clips and highlighting–I scan it from above and easily zoom down to what I need.

For me, electronic text is inscrutable and frustrating, like trying to watch a movie in the front row of the cinema with a pinhole camera: I can’t get any sense of scale or make sense of anything, and I get dizzy, to boot. There’s no way I could follow any kind of narrative and it’s a challenge not to barf. All the blue light, not enough screen, too many tabs and open windows and nothing findable. Stress nap!

I found this article to be super validating for me, especially since a few days ago I had already gone ahead and ordered some supplies! Thanks, Aimée! :)


Woops this post turned out way longer than intended, but I realized I should make a record of all the things I looked into first, so I don't forget and do this whole thing over again next year!

Annotated Bibliography, Chicago Style

when it includes manuscript sources, archival collections, or other materials that do not fit into a straight alphabetical listSo yesterday I took some notes on how to research better, and one of the sources I used was “The Annotated Bibliography Exercise” by Dr. Steven D. Krause from The Process of Research Writing.

It made good points about the usefulness of making an annotated bib. so I've decided to start gathering what sources I've used so far into a few of them (I have a few concurrent projects under the same general umbrella of utopia/etc). I'm going to have them here on the blog (on pages, instead of posts) but may not share them for a while.

But, before I start on that, I need to check out the specifics of how to do this in the Chicago Style. So, I figured I'd make a post on this, too, at the least for my own easy reference.

Annotated Bibliography in Chicago Style

Since I cannot afford access to the full Chicago style manual, I'm using these pages for reference:

• "Annotated Bibliography Samples" The Purdue Owl
• "Creating an annotated bibliography in Chicago style" Eastern Nazarene College 
• "Citation & Style Guide" Middlebury Libraries

According to these sites, an annotated bibliography entry done in Chicago style has:

• one summary paragraph describing the source and it's major features
• summaries can be descriptive or 'can evaluate the quality of scholarship in a book or article
• Another accepted method of making an annotated bib in Chicago & Turbian style is to have the proper citation and then the next line (indented) contain a very brief descriptive phrase in brackets, i.e. (from Middlebury Libraries): " [a seminal text describing argument in nonsymbolic language]

• The first line of each summary paragraph should be indented, but the rest of the paragraph does not need to be.
• The first line of the entry's citation must NOT be indented ("Hanging indent"), but if it spills over into subsequent lines of text, those SHOULD be indented.
• Text should be double-spaced, with 1" margins on all sides

.... Okay, well, the pages contradict each other on whether or not the whole summary (not just the first line) should be indented, so I went ahead and got a 30 day free trial for access to The Chicago Manual of Style Online (CMOS 17) (and... there isn't just a simple entry for how to format an annotated bibliography. ...?!?! Sigh. So, looks like I'm going to have to dig a little...

Building the entry:

• Author's names should be listed exactly as they are in the source, excepting when:
• there are different people using the same name & initials, a full name may be given. (15.12)
• If multiple authors have the same first and last name, middle initials can be added to clarify if they are known (14.73)
• A single author uses both their full name and initials in different works, the author should be listed by the same format of name for all their works (preferably the full name). (14.73)
• If an author is well known by both their full names & with their initials, the rest of the name may be added in brackets, i.e., (R.S. Crane + R[onald] S. Crane.(14.74)
• If an author always uses their initials, they should be listed with the initials, not their full names
• If the author or editor is unknown:
• Initial articles should be ignored (but included) and the entry should begin with the title. (14.79) 
• 'Anonymous' should generally only be listed if the work was explicitly attributed to "Anonymous" (i.e. on the title page, etc) (14.79) 
• If the author was not listed in the work but is known or guessed, the name should be included within brackets (and with a question mark when the identity is guessed but not known for certain) i.e., " [Hawkes, James?]. "  (14.79)
• If a Pseudonym / Pen name is used:
• Between the name and the period [pseud.] can be given. (14.80)
• If 'widely used', the pen name is treated like real names, i.e. Mark Twain or George Eliot
• If the real name is 'of interest to readers,' it can be included after the name (and before the period) in brackets. (14.80)
• 'If the author's real name is better known than the pseudonym, the real name should be used. If needed, the pseudonym may be included in brackets, followed by pseud.' i.e. you could list ' Brontë, Charlotte. ' or ' Brontë, Charlotte [Currer Bell, pseud.]. ' as the author of Jane Eyre. (14.80)
• If an author has published under different versions of their real name (as in married names, etc), a source should be listed under the name used in that work, but a cross reference note can be included, i.e. "Doniger, Wendy." and "---. See also O'Flaherty, Wendy Doniger."

Order of entries:

• Entries should be alphabetized by the last name of the author. CMOS recommends letter-by-letter alphabetizing, but word-by-word is also acceptable. (14.65)
• Hyphenated last names should be treated as one word, and unhypened names should be checked in reference sources, but for 'unhyphenated compound names of lesser-known persons for whom proper usage cannot be determined, use only the last element (including any particle[s])' i.e. Websters says that Ludwig Mies van der Rohe's last name is 'Mies van der Rohe', but Charlotte Perkins Gilman should be listed as Gilman  (8.6)
• Unusual name formats:
• Names starting with O' are treated as if there were no apostrophe (16.73)
• Names with particles (d', di, la, van, etc) can vary. Merriam-Webster's biographical entries are authoritative for the historical figures they include. Otherwise, personal preference of the author, and cross referencing of other sources (LoC, Websters, Encyclopedias, etc) should be done and one method decided on for that particular name. (16.71)
• Last names including Saint, San or St. should be listed as the family spells their name, but cross-referencing may be helpful (16.74)
• Titles such as Saint or King or place identifiers ("of England") are left out. (14.83)
• If a letter is accented, it is treated in this context as unaccented. (16.67)
• "Authors usually should not use the 3-em dash for repeated names in their manuscripts." (i.e., using '---' in a list of bibliography entries under the same author. Some publishers/editors might use them, though. (14.67)
• In bibliography (excluding bibs. of the works of a single author), 'titles by the same author' are usually listed alphabetically, with the initial 'the, a, or an' left out. (14.71)
• An entry with only one name should be listed before an entry starting with the same name but also including other authors. If multiple such multi-authored entries, they should be alphabetized by the next author's last name (though only the first author's name should be inverted) (14.66)
• If an Organization, corporation, association, etc, published something and there is no personal author listed, the group name should be listed as the author, no word inversion. (14.84)

Format:

• In the example image of an annotated bib. entry, the first line of the citation is a "hanging indent" but ALL the rest of the text is indented. (Figure 14.10)
• All formats of sources should be included in the same alphabetized bibliography, unless dividing it into sections would make it significantly easier for readers. Bib. lists might appropriately have divided lists when: (14.62)
• 'it includes manuscript sources, archival collections, or other materials that do not fit into a straight alphabetical list'
• 'readers need to see at a glance the distinction between different kinds of works—for example, in a study of one writer, between works by the writer and those about him or her'
• 'the bibliography is intended primarily as a guide to further reading'
• When a list is divided, 'a headnote should appear at the beginning of the bibliography, and each section should be introduced by an explanatory subhead.' Each source should only be included in ONLY one section. (14.63)

METHODS: Citing Your Sources-- Avoiding Plagiarism - Safe Practices - 2.4 Historical Methodology, saylor.org

Reading: Dr. Steven Kreis’s The History Guide: A Student’s Guide to the Study of History: I've just started working my way through Saylor.org's HIST104: Historical Methodology - The Art and Craft of the Historian, and I'm now on Unit 2: Basic Historical Research Skills. 

In lieu of me actually being in a class where things are discussed, I'll just write my thoughts about the materials here.

2.4 Producing a Finished Product

2.4.3 Citing Your Sources—Avoiding Plagiarism

Reading: Purdue University’s Online Writing Lab: Karl Stolley’s and Allen Brizee’s 

“Avoiding Plagiarism”: “Is It Plagiarism Yet?,” and “Safe Practices”

in "Is It Plagiarism Yet?" the author's reiterate that citation is needed for all words, ideas, visuals, and media that originate from any person, 'magazine, book, newspaper, song, TV program, movie, Web page, computer program, letter, advertisement, or any other medium'.

Citations are NOT needed for "common knowledge" ('folklore, common sense observations, myths, urban legends, and historical events'), 'generally-accepted facts' (including 'facts that are accepted within particular discourse communities'), your own thoughts, observations, conclusions, experiment results, or art (of any format).

According to the authors, a fact can (generally) be considered common knowledge if you can find it documented 'in at least five credible sources/' When in doubt, cite, and an editor or teacher can let you know what is superfluous.

 "Safe Practices" gives a number of suggestions of how researchers can avoid accidental plagairism down the line. This includes labeling 'someone else's words with a big Q' or use "big quotation marks." For ideas, you can label those from the source with a big S, and those from yourself with ME. And of course, always make sure the citation for your source is written with the notes.

 The author's instructions for paraphrases or summaries (whole list is a direct quotation)

•  Use a statement that credits the source somewhere in the paraphrase or summary, e.g., According to Jonathan Kozol, ...).

• If you're having trouble summarizing, try writing your paraphrase or summary of a text without looking at the original, relying only on your memory and notes
• Check your paraphrase or summary against the original text; correct any errors in content accuracy, and be sure to use quotation marks to set off any exact phrases from the original text
• Check your paraphrase or summary against sentence and paragraph structure, as copying those is also considered plagiarism.
• Put quotation marks around any unique words or phrases that you cannot or do not want to change: e.g., "savage inequalities" exist throughout our educational system (Kozol).

 For direct quotes, the author's recommendations include keeping the 'source author's name in the same sentence as the quote,' correctly use quotation marks &/or block-text format, according to the style, and to quote only the material necessesary (both in selections & amount of text within that selection.)

Ellipsis (...) can be used to remove excess information and thus shorten the quotation, but 'terminal puncutuation' should be maintained between the ellipses. Context or other slight changes to a quote can be done with brackets ( [ ] ) but one must 'be careful not to editorialize or make any additions that skew the original meaning' 

Writers should 'proofread and cross-check' with your notes and sources' to make sure all outside words, ideas, etc are properly credited.