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Assignment 1: Moravian Lives Transcriptions

The transcription of the Moravian manuscripts was a very unique opportunity to have. I’ve never been the first person to transcribe anything, so having the opportunity to essentially make history through these transcriptions is amazing.

I enjoyed trying to see the stories that the author was trying to convey. I was assigned with transcribing Anna Elizabeth Rauch’s manuscript that detailed her life from 1756 to 1762. Working with these transcriptions felt like looking at life through a different lens. I also liked the format of the transcription website; it was easy to mark People, Places, Corrections, etc.

I decided to take the role of group leader for this assignment because I felt like I needed to be more of a leader in life, and this was a good start. My role was to assign people which pages to transcribe and facilitate the Google Docs document that we would all paste our answers on. It was a rewarding role in that I got to know three more people pretty well, and coordinate us working together as a team to get these transcriptions done.

One of the primary struggles I faced was trying to read Anna Elizabeth Rauch’s handwriting. Anna wrote in Old English, so it was hard to comprehend a lot of her messages. The ink from one line oftentimes bled into the next line, so a strategy was to hold a finger right above the words to separate the individual lines.

Also, there were many words and abbreviations that were used which I had never seen before. This was due to a shift in our language throughout centuries. As the Old English words became more common, it became easier to transcribe what Anna said. Also, having a new group of friends to help me with whatever I couldn’t figure out was super useful.

Google Docs Link

Anna Elizabeth Rauch Page 1

Anna Elizabeth Rauch Page 2

Anna Elizabeth Rauch Page 3

Anna Elizabeth Rauch Page 4

Anna Elizabeth Rauch Page 5

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Assignment #1

Assignment #1

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Nv-N7N0rR6puaTNT2_QHv_918cxgYppQjCQikAxSNqQ/edit?ts=5b8ebfb1

(I did pages 18-23)

Researchers begin by taking a photo of the documents and posting them on websites for others to transcribe. Initially, it is very difficult to understand the documents. Some are harder than others depending on the time in which they were written and the language they were written in. It is also difficult if the document has been damaged overtime. In my case, I was provided an old document written in English but also containing a British accent. Some of the words had extra letters while others were missing some. I began by scanning the pages and recording the words I could easily read in the text box included. I typed question marks in the places for words I was unsure of. I then went back and analyzed the unknown words receiving help along the way from peers and Professor Faull. The final step was reading the sentences and trying to make sense of them. I attempted to figure out the last few unknown words and change words I had thought I had known but did not make sense in the sentence. By the end, I was able to obtain a sense of what my section of the memoir was all about. I was given the ability to feel the emotions of the characters in the story and relate the story to my life. I was born and raised Catholic, and I am still practicing today. I was able to understand the act of relying on and praying to Jesus as well as the thought of rising to heaven and being at peace. I attended Catholic School from pre-k 3 until I graduated middle school in 8th grade. We had been forced to write in cursive from a young age; this definitely helped in transcribing the documents. I enjoyed transcribing the documents as it is something I have never done before and differs greatly from my major.

 

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Assignment #1

Assignment #1-Rosemary Rong

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.

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Assignment #1

Assignment #1

Transcribing the Moravian manuscripts was a very interesting, as well as a rewarding experience. My task was to transcribe the Moravian manuscripts to create a digital edition by using a photo of the original archival document from archives in Bethlehem and London. To transcribe, I utilized the transcription desk on the Moravian Lives website, which was a very neat platform.

At first, the pages I was assigned by my group leader to transcribe seemed daunting. I had not primarily written or read cursive writing since the third grade, so reading the Moravian manuscripts was difficult at first. I felt a lot of pressure to be accurate in my transcription because I knew that if I transcribed something incorrectly, there would be negative effects on my work later in the course and the research project as a whole. Over time, recognizing words and abbreviations became easier, allowing me to transcribe the documents faster. The group setting made it particularly simple for me to get help when I was stuck on a word or unsure of an abbreviation. Specifically, my team (Brendan, Olivia, and Ethan) would help one another whenever they ran into trouble and look over each other’s documents to ensure accuracy. It was great to have such a strong group, especially when I just needed a second pair of eyes (and sometimes third) on my document.

The pages I was assigned detailed the lives of Joesph Lingard and Henry Unger. Over the days I spent transcribing the pages, I feel that I have been able to better understand the Moravians because I walked in the shoes of both Henry and Joesph. I look forward to the work to come as I will able to delve deeper into the lives of Henry and Joesph by doing text analysis and mapping.

My Transcriptions:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/17GZrXSICM6RDmdVB0SJjc1tS1njQ8CnGb-IUI9HrVKw/edit

Joesph Lingard Page 01

Joesph Lingard Page 02

Joesph Lingard Page 03

Joesph Lingard Page 04

Henry Unger Page 02 & 03