RJ#19: Fieldworking, Chapter 7
Chapter 7′s subject is archives, defined as collections of documents and artifacts. Much to our comfort as students today, the internet has enabled our research to extent farther than we could imagine. Artifacts are examples of tradition which can support our data. When approaching a collection of archival material, as researchers we must organize it- “chronologically, by size, by type or shape, by order from beginning to end or from inside to outside.” Archives support ethnohistory, defined as a study of the development of cultures. Again, as the chapter states, electronic archives (such as the internet, audio, video, music, etc.) help support our research.
Box 28: A Box about Boxes
Unfortunately, both my mother and father’s families live in Houston. So, I am unable to easily access particular archival collections that they may have. Also, being here at Commerce, I can not view my parents collections either. I must rely on an archival collection of my own. I have been in a serioud relationship for three years, with Glenn, my boyfriend. Since we started dating in 2006, I have maintained a keepsake box throughout the years, little did I know that it would benefit my English 102 class! 
After taking out everything from that overcrowded shoe box, I have developed three specific categories: paper materials, photographs, and solid objects. I can concously arrange them chronologically, but someone who does not share that relationship would not be able to by just looking at the contents.
Paper materials include: movie stubs (including out first date, October 27, 2006) ranging from our first to most recent movie (Paranormal Activities, October 19, 2009). cards (anivversary and holiday, also those “just because” cards). items from Junior Homecoming and Senior Prom include the table settings, the menus, the itinerary, and the invitation/ticket. there are also numerous notebook notes that have been added over the past three years.
Photographs include: our first picture taken together (Homecoming football night, October 13, 2006) up until pictures from last semester. [The majority of our pictures are housed in either my computer or in a frame.] The majority of the pictures are from our Senior Prom, 2008. The range from the afternoon getting ready (makeup, dress, etc) to the gathering with other dates, to the dance itself, to Project Prom, the event post-prom at Gameworks at the Grapevine Mills Mall.
Solid objects include: Although this is the smallest category, there are some solid objects arranged in the shoe box. There is a pink and a blue golfball, illegally taken from one of our first dates there is also a toy pig that I had sent him in while he was going to school in Kansas (it represented an “inside joke”). There is also a small, metal license plate that says “GLENN” on it, from California, which I bought while on our soccer trip to San Diego last season. The most inportant solid items are our dried boutineer and corsage from our Senior Prom. I love that I have been able to keep these items unharmed and for so long.
