More Thoughts on Projects
30 October
Several people have asked for more guidance on what Projects are supposed to be like, and I've been thinking about how to respond in useful ways. It seems to me that there are (at least) two approaches to project construction, each with advantages and drawbacks and particular difficulties.
- Narrative of process and discoveries, starting from a question (or group of questions). My Weblet on Civil Order and Weblet on The Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution are examples of this genre. The most difficult problems may be to keep focus, to create a consistent level of detail, and to know when to stop. This style is perhaps more like the traditional course paper (though in a hypertext form, employing multiple media, and intended for broader audiences) than the other.
- Guide to essential resources and Introduction for the curious about a subject, the sort of product one finds in many Web pages by enthusiasts for various subjects. The problems are mostly in the choice of materials to include, avoiding the trivial that anybody can find with a google search, and articulating the context that makes particular items worthy of inclusion. For this course, the Guide approach needs to include multiple media and needs to have a clear introduction which explains why the subject is interesting --how it connects with anthropology, what it adds to existing treatments of the subject, and so on.
Revisit the original assignment (http://home.wlu.edu/~blackmerh/anth230/project.html) and note especially that it requires that a Project
be a synthesis of the topic undertaken --not merely descriptions, but an exploration of a concrete problem
Assignment for Tuesday 4 November, by noon:
- Email me your thoughts on which of these models you think your project will follow (or suggest another if neither suits you), what you're intending to do to advance the Project in the next week, and anything you still think you need guidance or reassurance about.
- Continue to make log entries documenting your efforts to augment what you already have --reading notes, results of searches, insights, questions, qualms... Make it interesting for me to read your logs.