Building off of your blog post earlier this week, we’d like you to complete a comparative analysis of the some of the objects themselves. This lab will be completed with a partner so that you can continue getting to know other people in the course and develop strategies and processes that you might put to use in your final project.
Goals
- Familiarize yourself with your home institution’s digital collections, as well as those of other campuses
- Use your campus’s digital collections to find an object that you would like to examine further
- Complete a comparative analysis with a partner featuring the objects you identified
- Add an object and relevant metadata to our Omeka site
Specs
- Aim for approximately 1.5-2 pages single-spaced (a bit more is okay, but no less)
- Compare/contrast two objects (no more, no less): one from each of your home institutions
- Written in paragraph form (i.e., not a list or Q&A)
- Interrogate the objects and formulate questions about them and their representations, factoring in in a strong sampling of the proposed topics/approaches to analysis (listed below) and identifying potential gaps in the object’s representation
- Point toward an argument rooted in a comparison of these two objects and how they are documented on their respective pages
- Make an argument regarding the object’s potential significance
- Add object and metadata to Omeka
- Upload report via Canvas (each partner should upload the report)
- Include direct links to the objects you added on Omeka in your report
Introductory Videos
Watch three sets of introductory videos (institutional digital collections + object) provided by our wonderful library liaisons. You should watch the digital collections video from your home campus (if available) and two others. Then watch three object introduction videos — your choice.
Digital Collections Videos:
These videos are collection overviews with pointers to digital access. They will give you a general sense of what’s available at your institution, as well as how to access those materials.
| School | Collection Video |
| Bryn Mawr | Video |
| Carleton | Video |
| Davidson | Video (transcript) |
| Hamilton | Video 1 (transcript) and Video 2 (transcript) |
| Haverford | Video |
| Swarthmore | Video |
| Vassar | Video |
| Washington and Lee | Video (transcript) |
| Williams | Video (transcript) |
Seed Object Videos:
These are short videos in which our library liaisons tell you a bit about the seed objects and what sorts of questions they might ask about them.
| School | Object Video |
| Carleton | Oral history interview with founding Druids |
| Davidson | Georgia Club Photo |
| Hamilton | Woodhull Collection, suffragette newspaper, June 3rd, 1871 issue (transcript) |
| Haverford | The Black Student League Letter to the Haverford Board of Managers (Instagram Post) (transcript) |
| Swarthmore | Journal of Homophobic Events |
| Washington and Lee | Uncle Tom’s Cabin Vase (transcript) |
Object Identification
Now, go to your home campus’s digital collections. Identify an object that catches your attention and that touches on one or more issues related to this week’s topics regarding collections, archives, and social justice. In other words, the object you select should be different from but perhaps related to the ones listed above in the first table.
Digital Collections:
Lab Report: Comparative Analysis
(Exercise adapted from Austin Mason)
Your goal in this lab assignment is to observe, analyze, and compare the two objects you selected from your home institutions’ digital collections. In your report, you should aim to formulate questions and point towards an argument rooted in a comparison of these two objects and how they are documented on their respective pages. Put them into dialogue with each another, as well as your own perspectives and views on their institutional framing.
These objects are not necessarily figurative, symbolic, or made with a specific intended message in mind. They may have been made by students for a course or as documentation for a club or an extracurricular project. They may be part of your school’s historical record. Or, indeed, they may be a work of art. We are, therefore, much more concerned here with materials and materiality, form and function, context and description than with representation, although an object can, of course, be both functional and have symbolic meaning.
For example, consider a car key. On its own, it is a small metal object, sometimes containing plastic, rubber, or electronic components. To function for its intended purpose, however, it needs a vehicle, so its context is important to understand its utility. But it is much more than a simple tool. A car key can be a symbol of adulthood (only those who complete the DMV rite of passage may carry one), a marker of social status (some can afford luxury vehicles, some practical used cars, some none at all), or an indicator of living conditions (city dwellers are much less likely to carry one than suburban or rural residents). All of this is not necessarily readable from the object itself, but by combining your knowledge of the society in which an object was made and used with your powers of critical observation, you can formulate questions, hypotheses and interpretations that go far beyond physical description and can tell us things about the past that might not have been preserved in texts or otherwise.
Topics you might consider as you examine your objects:
- Key Physical Characteristics: Material, size, shape, color, etc.
- Origins: How were these things made? Which tools would have been needed and skills
employed to work this material into its present shape? Are they the work of one person or many? - Location: Where were these materials produced? Where are they now located?
- Ownership: Who has owned these objects? How, when, and why has that ownership changed?
- Function: How would they have been used? By whom? Is there evidence of different uses or reuse over time?
- Audience: For whom were these objects created? What sort of distribution or access might they have had?
- Context: Are they part of larger wholes, as a key needs a lock? Would they have needed other objects to make a set, like a single chess piece needs many more to play a game? What do they tell you about when and where they were made?
- Quantitative vs. Qualitative Features: Which features of these objects may be described qualitatively? Which quantitatively? What do these different approaches to the objects or these ways of knowing the objects tell you about them? In which ways do they overlap? In which ways do they not?
- Importance or Interest: Are they common or rare? A universally shared experience in this culture, one reserved for a particular group? Are they similar to or different from objects in our time and place?
- Records: What sort of information (metadata) is provided about each object on its respective page? What information might be missing? Why?
- Lingering Questions: What else would you like to learn about these objects? Why?
With each of these topics in mind (or at least a strong sampling), compare and contrast your two objects.
As you write, remember this assignment is principally about observation, analysis, the formulation of questions, and comparison. We don’t expect expert arguments — just your sincere efforts to observe closely and think deeply about, with, and through material and evidence.
Omeka
Finally, individually, add your selected objects to Omeka. Guidelines and tips for using Omeka can be found here. (Those of you who are more familiar with Omeka, may also refer to this Dublin Core guide.)