Digital Humanities Commons^™

The “Almanacks” Of Mary Moody Emerson: A Scholarly Digital Edition, Noelle Baker, Sandra Harbert Petrulionis

Documentary Editing: Journal of the Association for Documentary Editing (1979–2011)

Born in Concord, Massachusetts, on the eve of the American Revolution, Mary Moody Emerson (1774–1863) is most widely known today as the brilliant aunt of American Transcendentalist Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882). She was, however, an exciting figure in her own right: a scholar, a theologian, a proto-feminist, and an author whose writings offer a rare and prolific example of early American women’s intellectual production. In 1804, when she was thirty, and again in her seventies, Emerson published a handful of periodical essays. 1 But her most significant literary accomplishment is an unpublished series of manuscript “Almanacks” (c. 1804–1855), a miscellany …

Chimerical Mosaic: Self Test Kit In D# Minor, Seo-Young J. Chu

Publications and Research

CAPTIONS for CHIMERICAL MOSAIC : SELF TEST KIT IN D# MINOR (This was never meant.) Return address: landscape of raindrops or holes. Enclosed, to be opened by recipient only: (1) a picture held within a picture; (2) maplike divination; (3) a specimen of missing twin; (4) capsules of pure time; (5) invisible tears. …Perhaps you will wonder if these contents are alive or simply uncanny. …Perhaps you will seek in vain a symmetry that no longer exists. Let its absence equal noon , unreal gravities and unspeakable thirsts. (Do not estimate what she knows.) A mirror is also an exit. …

A Kachina By Any Other Name: Linguistically Contextualizing Native American Collections, Rachel Elizabeth Maxson

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Museums collect and care for material culture, and, increasingly, intangible culture. This relatively new term for the folklore, music, dance, traditional practices, and language belonging to a group of people is gaining importance in international heritage management discourse. As one aspect of intangible cultural heritage, language is more relevant in museums than one might realize. Incorporating native languages into museum collections provides context and acts as appropriate museology, preserving indigenous descriptions of objects. Hopi katsina tihu are outstanding examples of objects that museums can re-contextualize with native terminology. Their deep connection to Hopi belief and ritual as well as their …

Experiencing Women’S History As A Documentary Editor, Ann D. Gordon

Documentary Editing: Journal of the Association for Documentary Editing (1979–2011)

This is a modest revision of a paper written for a panel on the past and future of historical editing at the annual meeting of the Association for Documentary Editing in 2008. I thank Esther Katz for reading it in my stead. Richard Leffler edited the original and made valuable recommendations. This list of the women whose papers have received editorial treatment is not an exhaustive one. For Addams, see The Jane Addams Papers [microfilm] , ed. Mary Lynn McCree Bryan, (Ann Arbor, Mich.: University Microfilms International, 1984), and The Selected Papers of Jane Addams, eds. Mary Lynn McCree Bryan, …

“Dangerous Thoughts”? Margaret Sanger’S World Trip Journal, Japan, 1922, Peter C. Engelman

Documentary Editing: Journal of the Association for Documentary Editing (1979–2011)

Sanger’s longest and, I would argue, most significant piece of travel writing was her 1922 World Trip Journal, which chronicles her six-month tour to discuss birth control in Japan, Korea, China, Hong Kong and Ceylon, with stops in Yemen and Egypt, vacation time on the European continent, and a major conference in London. Coming just a few months after she formed the American Birth Control League in New York, the world tour raised Sanger’s international profile and gave her increased prominence at home, solidifying her leadership of the American movement. My focus in what follows is on the first leg …

An Assessment Of Recent Developments In Historical Editing, Jennifer E. Steenshorne

Documentary Editing: Journal of the Association for Documentary Editing (1979–2011)

The American historical editing profession has a rich and varied history of publishing projects ranging from the collected papers of great men and women to diaries of relatively obscure individuals. However, one senses that as the profession enters the twenty-first century, as new technologies appear, and as boundaries between disciplines are blurred, the profession is at a loss as to where to place itself. This article is based on a survey of current projects, both in the United States and internationally, from a variety of disciplines, and in both traditional print and new media. My aim is to broaden our …

Scholarly Editing In A Web 2.0 World: Presidential Address, October 16, 2009, Cathy Moran Hajo

Documentary Editing: Journal of the Association for Documentary Editing (1979–2011)

How many of you remember when the World Wide Web was new? I remember being thrilled by the things I could do, the information that I could find quickly, and the ability to spread the word about our work. I also remember being unsure how the Web would change the practice of editing. Lately, the design advances and the use of Web technology often described in shorthand as Web 2.0 have made me feel that way again. I am excited about the possibilities, but uncertain about some of the underlying premises of Web 2.0 and what it might mean to …

Review Of The Joseph Smith Papers, Journals, Volume 1: 1832–1839. Edited By Dean C. Jessee, Mark Ashurst-Mcgee, And Richard L. Jensen., Kenneth P. Minkema

Documentary Editing: Journal of the Association for Documentary Editing (1979–2011)

With the long-anticipated appearance of the first volume of The Joseph Smith Papers, a landmark project in American religious history and in Mormon Studies commences. Containing the scribal and printed remains of the founder and organizer of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, The Joseph Smith Papers, when completed, will amount to some thirty-two volumes—a phenomenal undertaking in an age when the magisterial, multi-volume printed edition is an endangered species. Under the general editorship of distinguished historians Dean C. Jessee, Ronald K. Esplin, and Richard Lyman Bushman, the edition is arranged in six series: Journals, Documents, Revelations and …

In Memoriam: W. W. Abbot (1922–2009), Making Something Of Life, Philander D. Chase

Documentary Editing: Journal of the Association for Documentary Editing (1979–2011)

George Washington, Bill Abbot wrote in his 1989 essay “An Uncommon Awareness of Self,” “saw life as something a person must make something of.” Several years of patiently editing Washington’s pre-Revolutionary papers had left Bill “with the impression of a man driven to master every aspect of his life and to make the most of what life offered.” Anyone who had the privilege of working with Bill Abbot, particularly during his long and distinguished documentary editing career spanning the last third of his life, is left with a similar impression of Bill himself.

Life Service Award Presented To Rich Leffler, John P. Kaminski

Documentary Editing: Journal of the Association for Documentary Editing (1979–2011)

I have known Rich Leffler for more than forty years. We both came to the University of Wisconsin in 1967 as graduate students in the Department of History. He came from New York and I from Chicago. Rich started to work informally with the Ratification project in 1969–70, when he went to Raleigh, North Carolina, to do research on his dissertation. He searched libraries for the Ratification project, the First Federal Elections project, and the First Federal Congress project. Officially, Rich started to work full time on the project in 1973, first as a researcher, then as assistant editor, associate …