Humanities at Work

Overview of Journal Entries

These journal posts are completed as part of DPH 201: Humanities at Work. They reflect on and interact with the texts read for the class and connect them to personal and multimedia elements. 

12/04/2025: Career Crossings Skills Reflection

Below are listed some of the strengths that stood out to me in the Skills Assessment as well as some of the areas I need to develop.

Seeing how my strengths mesh with each other, I was able to develop a better idea of what would fulfill me in the professional field. I love the idea of combining my ability to inspect primary material and interpret the patterns and connections within with my attention to detail. I want to work with items in museums and archives and use my skills to interpret them, but also use that knowledge base to educate the public through creativity. I love the idea of experimental archaeology and living history, being able to recreate elements of the past (ex: crochet, dresses, embroidery, etc), which would use my crafting textile skills (fine motor dexterity) and creative expression. Additionally choosing to focus on diverse and undertold stories, particularly those relating to gender and sexuality, is important to me. With all of these skills and passions I think I would thrive as an interpreter in a living history museum or as a historical reenactor. 

What I need to work on though, is my confidence in myself. I often doubt my ability to solve problems and communicate effectively, particularly through verbal communication. Communication and interpersonal skills are very important when attempting to translate research to a wider audience, like a museum. Furthermore, I often have innovative solutions but am two nervous that they are not good enough to actually take risks and share them. Procrastination is also a weakness of mine...

11/20/2025: Blood

Dr. Jen Gunter is an amazing author and now I want to read the entirety of her book. Her casual yet academic voice humanizes the topic and made me feel like I was having a late night gossip session sitting in a friend's car in the parking lot. She draws readers in with her acknowledgement of the absurdity of the stigmas surrounding menstruation. 

I appreciate that she began with not simply a biological description of how menstruation happens but why we evolved to have it (especially when only a handful of other species menstruate). Understanding the biological necessity for our period makes me scream at the world for having one (slightly) less. 

Once the biological basis is established, Gunter moves to the social and historical understandings and attitudes towards those who menstruate (historically considered woman or female, although we know this is not the case). Unfortunately, most of this is characterized by the social pressure to not discuss our cycles, which leads to misinformation or simply no information being available to young people attempting to navigate their periods. As Gunter notes, "without knowledge, there can be no informed consent" (Gunter 415). If we do not understand what is happening in our bodies and how other materials, like period products, affect our hormones and cycles. 

This is likely no surprise to you, but I was instantly interested in her brief discussion of how women dealt with periods historically, which most of the time we don't know much about it. I was reminded of YouTuber Abby Cox's video a few years ago in which she used a variety of primary sources (including the same 1733 murder trial of Sarah Malcolm that Gunter references) to make a guess at how a menstruating person in the 18th century would have delt with their period and then proceeds to test the apron. I highly recommend her video, she does a great job with linking sources. 

I was also curious about the idea that there is a lost "secret female knowledge" that allowed our ancestors to understand and have cure all solutions for their periods. Gunter stated that before the 19th century there was no reference to period products in medical texts (something Abby Cox claims as well), so of course I flipped to my favourite twelfth century medical text written by a woman (the Trotula if it wasn't already obvious) and took a quick look through. Trotula mentions the "menses" and includes several recipes/advice for regulating the flow of blood (often including bloodletting or in one case the smoke of "ginger, laurel leaves, and savin") with the aim of regulating and balancing the humoral system. However she does not make mention of what menstrual products someone with a average period, or even irregular period, might have used. If half of the humans on the planet spend significant chunks of their lives dealing with "Aunt Flo" why is talking about dealing with that so difficult?

10/09/2025: National Archives

The archivist, as noted in Randall Jimerson's book, Archives Power, holds significant power when it comes to retaining and shaping history. As he describes, the archive is at once a temple of preservation, a prison fearing attack and theft, and a restaurant (likely some little one in the French countryside that doesn't even have a menu but the server just rattles off to you in French*) in which the archivist assists researchers with navigating the menu/finding aids. It is the archivist and the archive which controls what gets saved, how it is saved, and who gets to see it. As only 1-3% of records are kept, according to the National Archives About Page, the archivist for the National Archives is able to choose what to keep in a way that shapes a very specific narrative, the narrative of the American Dream. The narrative in which everyone has family who have proudly served in the military (military records feature prominently on the National Archives website). The archive states that their collection "records important events in American history." Who decides what is important? Important to whom? What happens when events are decided to be not important?

When framing these questions in the light of the National Archives logo, it becomes evident that the overarching story of America found in the National Archives is one that celebrates and highlights qualities praised by a white Christian America (I do not equate qualities with people, there is a prominent story on the website about Martin Luther King Junior, who is seen today as embodying many of the positive qualities of 'what it means to be an American'). 

*DISCLAIMER: I have never been to France. This should not be taken as a true representation of French culture.

10/07/2025: Dr. M. M. Tetzlaff Talk

so good, will write blog post later (hopefully)

10/02/2025: Inheritance

I absolutely loved Dani Shapiro's memoir, Inheritance! I was so invested in the drama of her life, who her father was, and whether or not Ben wanted to meet her. She grapples with several important concepts as she works to define who she is and what her family identity means to her.

The biggest, and perhaps most obvious, question posed in the memoir is what defines a family. Is family a biological or social/cultural concept? Of course, it is both, but which one means more? For her entire life, Dani defined her family biologically. She was proud of her Jewish inheritance, particularly her father's clan. After the discovery of her sperm donor father and true biological roots, she struggles with transitioning her father from a biological and social role to purely a social influence. At first, in her mind a complete and 'true' relationship ought to include both biological and social ties. This possibility is unacceptable to her mind, and she comes to accept that she can have two valid father figures, Ben and her father. Rather than cutting her identity, as defined by her family, into two separate lives of before and after the discovery, and between the two men, she learns to simply expand her concept of self and include both, not either or. It is in this stretching that she creates a new definition of family and identity for herself. Her struggle can be seen in the passage above, where Dani sees herself as two distinct items: the box and the diver. And yet, as the diver and box meet in the ocean, they join together and expand the known knowledge of the whole. Today, defining family far beyond the biological boundaries is becoming increasingly common. 'Found family' allows people to value family for the emotional and social benefits more that the genealogical inheritance. 

Faith also plays a crucial role in Shapiro's definition of family. Despite claiming that she is not religious as an adult, much of her life decisions are affected by her identity as a Jew. She sought the advice of a rabbi. When Ben proposed a date to meet in person for the first time, Dani's first thought was that the time of year he proposed was during a set of important Jewish feasts. Her life, raised by an Orthodox Jewish father, is heavily steeped in the religious and cultural customs of Judaism. She clings to these customs as a way to remember her father and feel the familial connection. 

Below is another quote I found quite moving. I do not have anything particularly witty to say about these words but I thought I would share it.

09/30/2025: Julia Alvarez Lecture

I fear this applies to me every year when preparing for and experiencing these lectures. I fall in love with literature and the power of story in new and deeper ways every time. Being able to meet Julia Alvarez and listen to her incredible hope in the face of a life that has not treated her well has inspired me. 

Among many things, I was struck by Julia Alvarez's description of humanity as "the species that tells stories." From an anthropological sense, Alvarez is defining what makes humans uniquely humans is the fact that we communicate and build community through stories. Stories tell us who the collected 'we' is; they bond us together; they help us find ourselves though the loss of 'me' and the discovery of 'we'; they create a welcoming "portable homeland." I believe that we are drawn to stories because every individual story is a truth and when stories are collected they create truths that describe and define us as complexly as we desire. Searching for who we are is a fundamental desire of the human heart. In Alvarez's own words, "A novel is not, after all, a historical document, but a way to travel though the human heart" (In the Time of the Butterflies 324). These stories matter because they bind us together into community. By writing Dominican stories in the English language, Julia Alvarez grows a community that crosses borders and cultures. She provides a path by which to see each and every person as utterly and wholly human. 

It is not simply enough to listen to these stories, though, and imagine the community it builds. We are called to put into action both what we read and what we feel when we read. As Alvarez put it, we need to learn how to "walk the writing."

09/18/2025: Evidence & Obscurity

I have been reflecting on our discussions in class on Tuesday about what is captured in a photograph and what is left out. There is inherent bias in the photos we take, and where we choose to keep and display them, less so today than a few decades ago. Who is in the photos and who is not? When are photos taken and what are they trying to capture? 

When it comes to family history, this bias is taken further; what photos did generations previously choose to pass down? What notes, awards, and artifacts are kept? Can a family afford to keep such photographs and artifacts or even have them in the first place? What is saved is treasured, both for the person saving it and for whom it is saved. However, not all have the financial or physical means to store boxes of photographs or delicate garments. Naturally, this leads to an abundance of family evidence for wealthier and privileged families. Working-class families and families in which family history is or was not prioritized loose these precious mementos. The evidence in the world is vast and abundant and never fully found, and yet the knowledge lost without evidence remains far vaster. 

09/11/2025: Raclin Murphy Museum of Art

09/05/2025: Songs Without Words

09/04/2025: Visual Storytelling

Conclusion: A young woman in religious habit stands in a blooming garden with eyes looking down at a flower while holding a book.

Conclusion if I were being subjective and whimsical: The novice nun, in a moment of peace and solitude in the spring garden of her convent, meditates on the Passion of Christ through observing a passionflower and her illuminated book. She feels sorrow as she thinks about the permanence of death and the permanence of her upcoming vows. 

08/28/2025: The Headstrong Historian

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's fiction piece in The New Yorker, The Headstrong Historian, is an incredibly moving work. Her storytelling capabilities are phenomenal and I became so invested in Nwamgba and her family. Reading the descriptions of her joys and struggles, particularly her many miscarriages brought the strong emotions of Nwamgba's tale to life. The story reveals the complications of African history by introducing the most crucial element: humans. The relationships between Nwamgba and her family, culture, and colonialists twist between positive and negative. 

Stories have been the center of history and human understanding for thousands of years and in many cultures, such as Nwamgba's, oral storytelling traditions are more prevalent and powerful than the written word, which does not always exist. In the same way that I ask my grandparents about where their parents are from and what they loved to do as children, The Headstrong Historian is a story in which Nwamgba's life, culture, and heritage are recorded for her granddaughter, Aamefuna. Through the description of Nwamgba's family's reaction to her desire to marry Obierika, the reader learns how her culture perceives and reacts to slavery as well as the potential reaction of the earth god Ani; "Perhaps somebody in their family had committed the taboo of selling a girl into slavery and the earth god Ani was visiting misfortune on them" (Adichie). This comment provides the reader with some of the cultural and religious context of Nwamgba's early life. Details within the story pass along values and beliefs. 

Additionally, Nwamgba's story, through its individual and personal nature (something that storytelling cannot escape), the relationship, effects, and desires within the narrative of history are complicated. She wants the guns of the white soldiers in addition to fearing their power. Additionally, Nwamgba seeks out the Catholic missionary school even when the Anglican teacher condoned it as harsh and less sympathetic to the native culture. He assumes, wrongly, what will best serve her interests. Her goal is to teach her son English so that he can get ahead in life as there was no other way for him to do so. While the education has many bad effects on the mother son relationship, the skill of English does in fact help her son get ahead in this brave new world (yes one of my favourite books). These stories flip the traditional historical narrative that paints colonization as an entirely malicious practice (don't get me wrong, colonization and slavery were bad and should not be repeated). Nwamgba also critizizes her own system in this poignent quote:

Stories allow voices to be heard and through voices one can see how any and every system has a flaw. Nothing is perfect and humanity is complicated. Storytelling is not only an ancient tradition that has helped historians piece together a fragment of the past, it "make[s] a clear link between education and dignity, between the hard, obvious things that are printed in books and the soft, subtle things that lodge themselves in the soul" (Grace's ponderings, Adichie).

While this reflection has focused on oral and written stories, there are so many different mediums in which stories are told. Here are a few other examples: