Week Seven, in which the intern produces the first segment

What I am starting to see in my sleep.

     Yes, just like the title says, what I worked on this week was the first segment in a series of four that I need to produce. I spent a total of three days on "Citrus Tower". The first day was spent editing sound bites from the interviews I conducted with the two owners of the tower. The second day I re-wrote the working script I had to fit in with the interviews and recorded my voice reading it. The third day I spent putting it all together so I would end up with five minutes of run time for the segment. Then I sent the piece in to the FHS.
     So now what did I learn in this experience? First I learned that I need a better sound editing program, which by the way I did get after putting the piece together. So now I may re-edit everything again so the piece sounds a less bit rough. But at least I have it for the other three. The second thing I learned was that the outcome of the final product was never like what I intended for the piece to be. I wanted to discuss the idea of automobility and Florida tourism, which I did get to insert into the segment, but after the interviews I had to use what was said in the interviews. And I got a notion of using the concepts of Rosenzweig and Thelen (how the public engages with history as a personal engagement) and decided to use the idea of the carillon bells that everyone in Clermont hears as a sort of identifier of and with the tower. Then I used that to segue into the history and then back into the idea that the bells signify an idea of home and community. I bookended the segment with the sound of the bells chiming. I would say that the process was very different than I imagined it would be.
    About half of the ideas that I had on my pre-planning chart went out the window due to several criteria that I needed to meet. I needed to get everything I wanted to say with the piece in five minutes, I had to use what was said in the interviews, make it interesting enough for the public to listen, and it had to be about Florida history. A lot of the historical understanding at a master's level I had to forgo, otherwise it would have seemed too inaccessible. I had an outline of what I wanted to do, and it helped, but the piece came out totally different from what I initially envisioned. It is sort of similar to the historian writing an essay and going where the research takes them.
     As I have now finished the piece I wonder if the others will follow suit or even if I will go with my original ideas. It all depends. This process is very organic. Again I have to go with what I have and follow the criteria. Other than that everything is hunky dory. I am starting to understand that Veni, Vidi, Vici does not stand for "I came, I saw, I conquered" but is starting to take on the meaning "I read, I write, I edit" this summer.

Week Six, in which the grad student gets to the halfway point

     "You knew the job was dangerous when you took it Fred." -Super Chicken

      A quote from Jay Ward's 1968 cartoon series seems irrelevant in a blog that is supposed to be concentrating on scholarly pursuits but the point it makes is exactly one of the things I want to talk about this week. The point it makes is as graduate level historians we knew going into this field would keep us busy. Right now I am reading more books and articles than I ever have in my life. I am coordinating and scheduling interviews. I am keeping up on my work for the colonial class. I am interacting with family and trying not to be a phantom in their lives. It has kept me busier than a Lutheran at a Lutefiske bake-off. Trying to balance everything all at once seems ridiculous, and I will admit somethings are not being taken care of as well as they should, but what I am reading and the world I am coming into contact with is worth it.
     One of the concepts I am reading right now in Radio Utopia is about how radio functions within an educational role and how that information is then relayed to and understood by the listening audience. The other concept I am reading about is in Micheal Keith's book Radio Cultures and how marginalized groups use radio to overcome discrimination. What it all means is that there is more going on in radio than I had previously thought. It is a form of media, similar to the printed word forms or visual forms, that interacts with the public. Since this is a history program that I am involved with and it is interacting with the public therefore this is public history. As such there needs to be an understanding on what exactly is occurring when the four segments I am working on get aired. Information is constructed by the author in the form of a script for a segment. The information contained in that segment is then aired out over the radio waves to the audience. The audience then listens and makes meaning from the information. In essence it is a series of complex negotiations between the author/creator of the segment and the audience similar to the engagement that exists between  visitors and museum. What I am trying to get at here is to say that radio is a medium that can be and is used to disseminate historical research out to the public. How the public interacts with that presentation of research should be recognized by the author.

I quote often from this book. 

     I am reminded of Roy Rosenzweig's and David Thelen's canonical work The Presence of the Past in thinking about this interaction and engagement. Presence of the Past stated two main points; first the public engages with history in a personal manner and second the public has different amounts of trust to the different mediums of disseminating historical events. Movies and television programs rated at the bottom of the list. Radio being another form of media could be seen as belonging there as well. So does this mean that no one will trust the information I am putting in my segments? Well yes and no. Generally the public will have some level of mistrust but the program I am working for is part of the Florida Historical Society. In The Presence of the Past list Museums, and by default historical societies, rate at the top of the list. Somewhere there is a middle-ground to the level of trust between the segment and public then. How does this relate to my work you ask? By putting a more personal approach to the segments I can engage with the public in a manner more suitable to their engagement with the history presented. For instance instead of just getting an interview with the current owner of the Citrus Tower, Dr. Brotemarkle suggested that I obtain interviews with some of the people who live and work around the tower. This personalizes the tower as something that everyday people engage with on a constant basis. It gives a personalized meaning to a structure that I would categorize as an architectural artifact. But presenting it as such would be cold and too scholarly for the public. Utilizing both approaches gets the scholarly information out but allows the public to engage with the information in the personal way, which is how they negotiate historical meaning in the first place.
     So yeah, you could say I have been reading a lot of theoretical books in the past week. This is just a preview of what I will be putting into the final paper at the end of the semester. I just need to find the time. Sleep is so overrated.
 

Week Five, in which the intern starts contacting interviewees

     Ah the joy of contacting interviewees. "No sir, I am not trying to sell you anything." "No ma'am I am not one of those annoying pollsters." These are but a few phrases that every historian who wishes to conduct oral  interviews must face when starting to contact interviewees. I have learned that the pre-interview process is about as important as the actual interview process. That gaining the trust of the interviewee will determine the outcome of the interview and the overall project. Without it you could get the worst results possible;  mono-syllabic answers or worse yet no answers. When talking with interviewees I have learned that talking to them about the interview in terms of what the project is, what you are going to ask, who will hear it, and telling them a bit of what you already know about the interview topic from extensive research tends to "get them on your side" a bit better than a cold call and a set-up for an appointment to record.
      I want interviewees to feel comfortable with me during the interview. I become a Zelig quick, but it must be an honest "I am just like you" feeling because interviewees can smell dishonesty quickly. I also want them to understand that what they have to say is very, very, very important. Because it is. Despite the theories on memory and perspective what the interviewee says is paramount to any oral history; whether that be an interview, recorded memory, or a podcast. It is history from that individual's perspective. Recording it gives a viewpoint from that interviewee. It gives them a voice; agency in the historical process. So again what they say is important and I want to get that voice recorded. I want a piece of evidence to place in the archive that says "this is _____'s viewpoint" or "this is what _______thought". To parlay that to the interviewee lets them know what they have to say or their opinion is valued. That honesty is what I try to convey to the interviewee during the pre-interview. That to me is where either a good interview or bad one is made.
     Now about this thing called research. I can not stress to anyone how research into the topic helps make or break an interview. You start going on and on about what you know and the interviewee will look at you like a rube. You have to cultivate their response. You have to give them a little bit about what you read and get their response. You do it again but you listen to their response even more intensely. Soon you are having a conversation about the topic and you have gems to mine for your project. Going in with all guns ablaze with "Oh I read this article or this book and it says _______," will get you stares Smartypants. Going in with a soft touch makes you seem like you want to learn more about the topic from them, the interviewee. It reinforces that what they say is important to you the interviewer and in affect the project.
     Well I will step off of my soapbox for now. I have given my opinion on the advantages of a pre-interview process and now have to go off and practice what I preach. Until next week dear follower.

Week Four, in which the intern starts putting it all together

One of my segment topics

Wait we are at week four of the summer term already? One third of our time is gone? Well it is a good thing that I have been busy dear follower. Today I am putting the finishing touches on the abstracts that I will be sending to Dr. Ben Brotemarkle and keeping him informed of my progress. Right now I have contacted several interviewees for two of the segments and am waiting to start scheduling for recording them. Two of the segments I have already developed (in my mind). These being a segment on the Citrus Tower in Clermont, Florida and a segment on the 88 year football rivalry between St. Cloud High and Osceola High Schools. Most of the research has been done for both seeing as how I have taken the oft used avenue of using research from papers that I have already done for other courses. Oh surely it is a time honored tradition of master's level historians to lazily mine previous research for other projects. Quite simply I have no time between class, the internship, life, a new kitten who will not stop nibbling my toes, babysitting
a grand-daughter, and previous commitments, to come up with some dazzling new topic or novel approach. Again I see myself as some sort of academic juggler, juggling all of these things, not wanting to drop any of them and dividing my time between them all.
     Enough woolgathering, some of the new topics I discussed with Dr. Brotemarkle were doing a segment on the 50th anniversary of UCF, and some new information that I will be keeping top secret from you dear follower until I get the go ahead from the parties involved. I can give you a hint and say the following words: newspaper, civil rights, drywall. No, no, no dear follower. I will not divulge any information until later. Deal with it. I am up to my armpits in secondary sources, books, kittens, a 3 year old grand-daughter, and course work and I am not going to give in to your pleadings. Wait and see. I promise it will be good.

The new kitten and I hard at work on secondary source analysis

     So that is where I stand now. Completing abstracts, coordinating interviews, and completing secondary source analysis on MORE books. I and Dr. Beiler agreed that the annotated bibliography was a bit heavy on practical works and light on theory. Ah, but do not fret, we have that under control. Dr. Linenthal has a book on public history theory and communication that will take care of everything. I have read his other books and am quite certain it will deal with happy topics and sunshine ( I am of course being sarcastic), and of course I still kept my books from the Intro to Public History class. And no dear followers I did not write in big black magic marker the words discourse and consensus history in them. I saved that for the secondary source analyses. Until next week.