Sarah, your project seems very well planned! If nothing else,
you've certainly made reviewing it a challenge. You plainly stated
your goal, which seems reasonable yet ambitious. It borrows much from
existing scholarship, but lets you apply what you've learned to
create an assignment with information that nobody else would really
have access to.
I can't think of any other particularly relevant cognate
projects, though it is somewhat interesting how genealogical interest
manifests in social networking. I am a member of a Facebook group
dedicated to the genealogical line of the Derasp family, and while I
fully admit that genealogy has never been my greatest interest, I
have learned a good deal from some of the posts there. That kind of
networking certainly helps reach out to people who may have more
information on your genealogical line, even if it's something as
simple (but important) as alternate spellings.
Your plan to digitize your family tree, and some primary sources
available to you should turn out to be useful experience in the
process of digitization. I'm not sure if you already have extensive
experience with digitization, but you could view this as a chance to
develop that skill further – even if it's not a new skill per se.
I think you could stand to elaborate a bit on one aspect of this
project, which seems to be something mentioned early on and then
never really expanded upon. You mention that you plan to explore the
evolution of the German Transylvanian Saxon culture, and propose
using your family history with traditional historical material to
accomplish this, but it doesn't seem to fit with the rest of the
project. Everything else looks to be about digitizing your family's
history and providing compelling ways to look at that history, which
sounds like a totally worthwhile endeavour, but not one that fulfills
that earlier goal. Are you planning on incorporating this analysis
throughout your project, or will this be a distinct part where you
reflect on how your family's history fits into this traditional
narrative?
It's certainly not a criticism, or something I think needs to be
included in this project, but it's worth considering the point I
think I brought up in class. It would be interesting to explore how
small-scale, personal projects such as this one could be used to
build histories from the ground up. Detailed records of smaller towns
and villages may be hard to find, but enough information from people
who lived in these places might allow us to gain some perspective
that was previously inaccessible. Do you intend to make the
information you provide on this presentation publicly available, or
are you thinking of restricting usage based on privacy concerns? Both
courses are certainly justifiably, but it's something to consider if
you haven't already.
All-in-all, looks like a solid project! I'm looking forward to
seeing how it turns out.
Cheers,
Trevor
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