1)Link to transcriptions of your assigned memoir pages: (P9-P16,8 pages in total, written by Willey)
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1zOTUXh2VYeFLDoZfbqKbYCa9QtGikaS4gYO-hvPEmPg/edit
2)The process of digital text creation, your connection to the documents, and your process of creating a precise digital text.
After spending 12 hours on recreating 8 pages of 19th century England memoirs in digital version, I felt fully immersed in the environment of guessing the author’s thoughts and adjusting his style. The part which I transcribed focuses on a man’s faithful religious beliefs and his ardent curement as the man suffering from a severe disease.
The reason why I chose this piece of memoir is that its handwriting is similar to old-fashioned pirate treasure maps on yellowed parchment which were created at the same time in history. However, the first problem I encountered is that several pages are completely blurred. I acquired for clearer version and in a week, Prof. Faull sent our team a much clearer version recopied from an England archive library. Thanks to large computer screens, I edited my transcription and looked up words in the online dictionary on the same screen. With Carrie’s help and online tools like Google translate and Wiki, I have learned to identify words with high frequency like “were,” “by,” “task,” “removed,” and old places names like “Cootehill,” “Mirfield,” and “Ballinderry.” Beyond the first rough transcription, I revised my 8 pages for 4 hours in two days to correct word spellings and sentence grammar. For example, I looked up “to recover quickly” in Chinese when I realized that page 12 is mainly talking about a man is suffering from severe sickness and was looking for related words to replace the words that I did not understand.
During the last process, I managed to reduce my transcription from dozens of confusing words down to one or two. At the same time, I marked up all the places and names. For 30 minutes, I finished up checking all my transcription again and read through all the 8 pages together to generate the whole idea of this part of memoir.
Rosemary is a sophomore studying in Digital Humanity class in fall 2018 at Bucknell University. She is from Southern part of China. Her intended major is Environmental Studies and French.
