Grunt Work

This week I spent eight hours scanning and sorting the physical copies of interview and an additional four labeling and sorting the scanned files into an excel spreadsheet file.
My last post had a pretty great summary of  what office life is like for me.

One thing I learned: to make sure everything is saved to more than one source. My computer crashed (literally... and screen separated from body). Fortunately I had been saving to a USB, but that reminded me to save it to a third source as well...

This coming (and final) week I intend to gather all of the hardcopies of what I've done and talk to Trish, my mentor. She will let me know whom I should talk to so that my efforts can be utilized by the playwright.

Unfortunately I did not get to interview more people about their lives in Sanford. However, depending on schedules, I might be able to do some of that this coming summer. We'll see. I don't have to volunteer just for school. ;)

This week is a particularly short blog because I am saving my "reflection over this full semester" for my last entry next week.  

An Office Job

           This week I spent a day in the office scanning paper, and another day labeling and sorting the digital files from those scans.

Like the transcription work, I do not feel like there is any enthralling revelation that I have from this. I am spending hours and hours processing hundreds or thousands of pages (digitally and physically) so that later someone else won’t have to.

 Here is a glimpse of what I was doing in the office:

1. The day started with a cup of coffee (see my lovely yellow mug) which I brought from home (because coffee makes every morning better).

2.Then I set up my printer/scanner. The office already had two other fax/printer/scanners but one of them could not connect to a computer and the other scanned each page independently. I needed my machine to scan 30 and 50 page documents as a single document, and so I brought one from home.

3. Then I dredged the files from the cabinet. As I opened each folder I compared them to our digital database so that I wouldn’t make duplicates. Then I scanned the transcription and permission/release forms separately (for ease of access later.) Then I stapled/paper clipped the interviews to their release forms and re-filed the physical copies alphabetically.

4. I have several new office friends now. One is the printer function which scans stacks of paper at a time. This process would be infinitely longer if I had to copy each page individually. The others come as a conglomerate: paperclips, staple remover, stapler, and sticky notes… These are the essentials of any office.

        Here you can see how much I’ve done. I feel successful when I stack it all together like that. 

 The next step is naming and organizing the digital files so that I can (finally) complete an excel. Imagine so much work for one spreadsheet?

This is why no one likes paperwork… Except that I did enjoy the repetition of the task. I don’t want to make a career of this job, but I am enjoying a few days in the office. 

So. Much. Paper.

       The last time that I walked into the optometrist for an appointment I noticed that they still kept their files in physical copies, and I wondered, why? It seems so inefficient. It seems like a difficult database to search since it is stacks and filing cabinets of paper. I now know why. It takes an incredibly long time to transfer information from hard-copy to digital database, especially if it is not impeccably organized to begin with.

       When I started my new task I thought that it would be a decent amount of work, but I had no idea of exactly how much. I hoped that I would have time to conduct more interviews. If I do have enough time for more interviews it will be a miracle. Right now I am almost overwhelmed by the sheer quantity of paperwork.

       This week I started organizing and labeling documents so that I can scan them into a digital file and then incorporate that file as a hyperlink into an excel document so that Jules Corriere, the new playwright, can make good use of the information that we already have.  

       I am really proud of myself for not getting a paper cut… yet, but I did get a crook in my neck.

Instead of the earlier work that I was doing (which required my interaction with other people) this job is really lonely. To some degree that is good. The office where I am working is secluded, so I can take off my shoes and listen to music while I sort and file and scan and list. It is nice to create my own work environment, but I do miss talking with people.

Change Will Come

                For those who have not seen Celery Soup’s production of Touch and Go (and you should) the title of this article is the name of one of their songs and a theme of their productions. I chose it because this week marks a change in my internship. I am under new supervision (My previous mentor is enjoying her vacation in China, but she will be back in time for my final review.), and my project focus has changed.  Since I have completed by four interviews my new task is organizing the interviews that have already been recorded or transcribed so that the new playwright can easily access them in the future. To that end, I spent time with Linda on Monday as she explained the current state of the documents (a combination of physical transcriptions, digital documents, and audio files) so that I may begin organizing them in an excel document. My first step has been organizing and labeling the digital files (grouping files by interviewer/interviewee). My next step will be sorting through the hard copies so, comparing them to the digital copies (checking for duplicates, etc…) and scanning copies to fill gaps in our digital information.

                Meanwhile, I am also finishing my fourth transcription.

                Something else Linda and I did while we met was travel around downtown Sanford so that she could introduce me to several other people whom Celery Soup wants to interview.

Although it will be impossible to interview and transcribe more interviews, I hope to at least conduct one or two more interviews for the database. Honestly, the interview is my favorite part of this process. The other aspects necessary and somewhat engaging, but I absolutely love talking to the people. I love hearing the new stories. I guess that makes me an extrovert? 

The Butler

          You know what’s odd about transcription? When sit in my corner I am not attentive to anything around me: my eyes on my screen, my mind on their words, and my headphones in my ears. For all intents and purposes it is solitary work. Unfortunately, I am a social person. I draw energy from people interactions and conversations. I thrive in movement and discussion–Which is probably why I think the interview process is so much fun. The surprising think about transcription to me is that I don’t feel alone while I do it. Even if I am not adding to the conversation, I get to listen to a conversation. While I type out their voices I assume almost the same silent-listening role as when I conduct the interviews.

As I predicted last time, the hardest part about transcribing my most recent interview (about the Butler movie with seven participants) at first was discerning one speaker from another. Some of the voices are very distinct, others less so.  Since I anticipated this problem, during the interview I noted which speaker discussed each topic so that, if I had trouble, I could just reference the notes. As I get farther along in the transcription, it gets easier to tell each of the ladies apart.

Also, many of the women from that interview were happy to give a follow-up interview based on the topics we discussed – which is super exciting. Therefore, while I transcribe this interview I am also noting several topics and discussions that they showed an interest in. Those topics can then be used as a springboard for their next interview.

Dinner and a Show

My fourth interview took place this Monday night at the Sanford History center in downtown Sanford. I led the interview, once again, but it was different from all of our previous interviews because we used a movie, The Butler (2013) to help us set the tone for the questions. For those who have not seen this film, it is the about a butler at the Whitehouse who served for seven presidencies and during the civil rights movement. As we watched the movie we strategically paused and asked questions of the ladies present. Unfortunately, the male interviewees were unable to attend this viewing. The responses we received were intriguing and sometimes startling. To me, the most interesting part was their consensus on so many things although their origins and backgrounds were often very different.

For those who have not seen the film, here is a link to the trailer.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DUA7rr0bOcc

Because it began around dinnertime we served sandwiches and fruit and drinks so that everyone felt comfortable. The questions I asked were prepared beforehand, although I occasionally pursued side trails based upon their answers. I focused on the topics of family and race relations and sought the themes of community, helping one another, and relationship. Here are a few examples of my questions.

1. Louis couldn’t understand why his father would serve as a butler. In fact, he was ashamed of his father’s position. When Louis went off to college, he became involved in the Civil Rights Movement. Cecil strongly disagreed with Louis’ choice. He was ashamed of his son’s decision. Cecil was so upset, he didn’t speak to his Louis for years. And the central image of fortitude that stands between them is Gloria who holds the family together. How did the age difference between you and your parents cause you to have different perspectives on things?

2. In your family, did you discuss desegregation? How did you feel about the issue? Did your family agree with you? What divisions did it cause among you? How did your friends discuss desegregation? How has your parents’ view of racism changed who you are?

3. In an interview Oprah stated that “Gloria is every woman. She represents every mother, wife, sister, friend and daughter who grew up when women were the silent backbone for everything and everybody. Women who sacrificed their dreams and desires for the greater good of family and children.” - Oprah Winfrey Describe the backbone of your family growing up. Who held everyone together?

All of the interviewees seemed keen to continue this discussion. The length of the actually interview was limited due to the length of the movie, but it stirred up thoughts which will be wonderful to readdress in a follow-up interview.

Another way this sort of interview could be conducted (for time’s sake) is by showing short 5-10 minute clips (perhaps from YouTube) to engage emotions and inspire interesting conversation.

One Down, One to Go

I am so excited because I finally finished editing the instruction manual for Celery Soup! It took a lot more time and effort than I thought it would–organizing all of that information and formatting it neatly and correcting errors–and a lot of the information was already vaguely assembled by a previous intern. I have a new respect for the time it takes to organize people and information in a professional way.

         My next interview will be on Monday, March 16^th based on the movie The Butler. This interview will be particularly interesting because it will incorporate a lot more interviewees (at least seven people will be attending) who are unrelated.  This means there will be new challenges. It may be difficult to maintain control over the conversation when we discuss a topic which interests several of the interviewees at a time. It will be difficult to keep the interviewees from overlapping. It may be more intimidating to question a group. Since there will be more challenges, there will be several things I must keep in mind (and since I just finished my instruction manual to help the next intern along, I know what I must be careful for). It will be important to ask questions directly to a person and not vaguely at a group. I should use the names of the interviewees I am talking to for ease of transcription later. Perhaps the most difficult thing to remember will be to keep track of time.

     

The End... In the Middle

          The highlight of my week was my presentation to the board of Creative Sanford. It was a very cozy affair. They were all together for their monthly meeting, so we pulled eight fold out chairs into the lobby of the Sanford Welcome Center and projected my power point onto a large computer screen. They usually meet in a room in the back of the same building, but we did not think there would be enough room for the presentation.

         Having the chance to present to them was a joy! Although I had met almost all of them previously (by attending the play and interviewing the actor) this was the first time that I got to tell all of them about my internship. It made me wish that I made this presentation earlier so that when they saw me behind the scenes we would have understood each other better. I understand that telling someone what I’ve done before I’ve started is somewhat odd. At first it felt odd to give the presentation in the middle of my internship (although logistics required it). By the end of the presentation I realized that the timing was perfect. As it is, I got some feedback on how I am doing and what they would like to see. If I presented after I finished my internship then their advice could only be little nuggets of wisdom to pass on to the next intern.

          This presentation gave me the opportunity to tell them why I chose Celery Soup, because they do a marvelous job recording and relaying history. That is, the most important parts of history–not merely names and dates and facts. Like most stories or creatively rewritten histories, they were less concerned with facts or details than in the “truth” of experience, be they

moral, spiritual, or psychological nature. As I said in my initial post, I believe that, while names and dates have their place in recording factual events of the past, the most important aspect of history is the transference of memories from one generation to the future.  

Another Fishing Line

Thus far, I have been working as a line catcher for celery soup, reeling in the best stories in hopes of an exciting tale. Usually I am collecting stories from locals in order to write them into a future play. This week, I spent time line catching from the play actors themselves.

          This past Saturday Touch and Go became the first community production on the stage of the Dr. Philip’s Center in downtown Orlando. 

In between their performances this Saturday, I had the opportunity to ask the performers and stage crew questions. How did you get involved with Celery Soup? What has been your favorite scene to perform or watch? What would keep you from working with Celery Soup in the future?  What do you hope this play will teach the actors, the audience, the Sanford community? Several of these conversations stayed brief and to the point because the speakers were busy with their families, preparing for the show, or unwilling to share very much. Fortunately others were very willing to talk and our conversations brought about both laughter and tears.

I also got another perspective of the stories when I talked to several audience members. They did not let me record their interviews, but I did learn from them. Like many of the actors, they were amazed and delighted the bonds between actors and stories despite the actors’ background, origins, or ethnicity. Like many actors they congratulated the play at both promoting that and living it out.  

Conducting these interviews will help Celery Soup through the rigmarole of paperwork. But that is not all it will do. Because of their testimonies I better understand what sorts of stories the community is interested in and what aspects of those stories make them fascinating and engaging for both the actors and the audience. As I transcribed this week I continued to think about this. What stories would be best in a play? What themes might be prominent in the next play? What keywords should I highlight to make that more possible? 

Posting Questions

          This week I am spending almost all of my time transcribing. I listen to the audio we’ve recorded during the interview (at .75 speed) and I still have to pause every thirty seconds or so because the speaker is talking too fast. (I’m very excited because I’ve finally finished transcribing the longest interview!) Instead of subjecting y’all to another blog about typing, I am going to talk about using questions to direct interviews.

          One of the hardest things about conducting an interview is staying on task. During our first interview, Trish took the lead which meant that I could interject thoughts or pose questions whenever they occurred to me. However the lead interviewer cannot respond willy-nilly to the interviewees. In their mind there must be a preexisting map with broad strokes on where the conversation needs to go.  As an example, in this series of interviews, we are specifically looking for stories of romance, stories about hard times, about times when the community came together, about someone’s help in desperate times.

          Yet, we still need all of the stories that do not fit into these categories. If we limit ourselves to just our keywords, we will miss all of the story gems that litter the periphery of the tales. Discerning the line between superfluous detail and becomes the interviewer’s task. My task. So far, I have found that the best tool for to directing the conversation is preparing questions beforehand which apply specifically to the interviewee’s life and which will likely lead to both interesting stories and tales which incorporate the themes we are looking for. 


Some generic introduction questions are always helpful: 
Include community based questions: 
  o Describe two things that make you distinctly you?
  o How long have you been here in Sanford?

Before the interview I knew that Faye was a gospel musician, so I prepared several questions (20) about that. If you know anything about the interviewee, prepare questions which specifically relate to their life.Here are my examples:
    o What is the most important thing your family taught you about music?
    o What was the first tune(s) you learned?
    o  How has your religion affected you music?
    o  How has your heritage affected your music?
    o   Have you ever seen God do something miraculous here in Sanford?
    o  Has your singing ever been on obstacle for living life?

Avoid technical questions, questions which will result in a one or two word answer, or questions which are too specific to the interviewee:

    o Have you been in competitions? Any prizes? 

    o  How do you handle mistakes during a performance?

Don't forget romantic questions:
    o   When you went on a date, what did you do? where did you go?
    o   When did you first meet your husband?

Ask questions about their connection to this town:
    o  How has your music (or life) impacted Sanford?
    o   How has Sanford affected your life (music, whatever they do)?
    o   Describe an event that changed the appearance or character of Sanford?
    o   What was your favorite location in Sanford? is it still here?

Ask questions about community and friendship:
    o Can you remember a time when someone helped you just when you needed them?
    o Describe a day when you are most happy to be in Sanford.
    o If you can pass one thing on to the next generation, what would it be?

Prepare questions based on other keywords that Celery Soup is currently looking into.

          When you have composed all of these questions, sort them by category, so that you can easily access them in the middle of the interview. Also, accept the fact that most of your questions will remain unused. You need a plethora of questions to choose from, but will never have time address them all in a one or two hour interview. Perhaps rank your question, marking the ones that you absolutely want to address. 

Faye Henderson

          This Wednesday I led an interview with a woman named Faye Henderson. Her husband, John, and she co-pastor a church there in Sanford, and she has a phenomenal voice. Her mother raised her in the state of Florida but they lived in several cities. Faye currently holds a position in Celery Soup’s play this year, using her voice in the rising action of the play.

            Before coming to the interview, it was important for me to think about what I would say during the interview. First I looked her up online and on Facebook to find out basic information about her life. Then I used what I found out to compose questions which might lead to more interesting stories and which would incorporate the themes and keywords which we are thinking about using in our upcoming play. Next I typed up these questions, there were enough to fill an entire page, which is beneficial since I did not know which questions would spark Faye’s interest.

           When I arrived, Trish and I had thirty minutes before the interview to discuss my plan. She asked me to think about which direction the interview might go and how I intended to guide it there. She also critiqued my questions, identifying the most promising questions and cautioning me regarding those questions which would lead to a technical discussion instead of a narrative story. Trish also reminded me how to check the recording devise before and during the interview.

          Our conversation ranged through childhood, to grandparents, love, romance, orange groves, gospel singing, parents, siblings, moving, mentors, and many more topics.        

Overall the interview was a dream... and now I have a lot of transcription work to do.

Touch and Go

          Last night, I had the chance to watch a performance of Touch and Go by Celery Soup (inspired by the touch and go of airplanes practice landing, and the way people and events momentarily touch our lives). Going in, I knew what to expect because I read through the script several weeks ago. Understandably, the performance was not cinematic brilliance since the cast consisted entirely of volunteers. Nevertheless it offered a superb example of good story telling because it got two things right.

First it demonstrated this generation’s connection to the past.

          The entire play is a continuum of recollection about the past of this town. Through words and visuals they impressed upon the audience their own connection to the past by remembering great events in the town’s past and characters who have strut and fret their brief hour upon the stage, but are heard no more. They told stories about the past, and reminded the audience that our present will soon become a new past. How we live, what we do, whom we remember will impact the future. True to good storytelling, they recognized that history has neither beginning nor end. Arbitrarily history chooses one moment or experience from which to look back or, perhaps to look ahead. This method of remembering forced the audience to think about the concept of change: the good, the bad, the inevitability of it all.

Secondly, Touch and Go reminded the audience that history is memory, a tenuous thing.

          

          Once a memory is forgotten, the story is dead. History dies. In a particularly arresting scene at the end of the play, a woman comes on stage and recalls her ancestor’s enslavement from Cameroon almost four hundred years ago. Then she recalls their children, great-grandchildren, great-great grand relations to her. She recalls how her enslaved ancestors told their children stories from the past because they were not allowed to learn to read or write it down. We remember them, she say, in respect. When their memory dies they are gone, and they will end with her. Without children to remember her past, who will listen to her past and remember them? Will we remember them? Will we remember her? Who will remember Sanford?

Another great strength of Touch and Go  was the transfer of true stories, albeit with a little creative re-working.

"Artists use lies to tell the truth. Yes, I created a lie. But you believed it, you found something true about yourself." ― Alan Moore, V for Vendetta

          Like most memoir stories or creatively rewritten histories, the playwrights were “less concerned with facts and details than in the “truth” of experience, whether of a moral, spiritual, or psychological nature.”[1] As I said in my initial post, I believe that, while names and dates have their place in recording factual events of the past, the most important aspect of history is the transference of memories from one generation to the future.  

“Some stories demand to be remembered. They help us make sense of our lives, connecting us to one another and to those who lived long ago. As [the] characters come to understand the truths that give their lives meaning, so, too, do we.”[2]

Oh...It's Actually Work

What I lacked in skill

I made up for with enthusiasm...

              I was very excited to start my transcription work this week (did you catch the past tense?) I had grand schemes it finish it faster than expected and then apply to transcription jobs online… However, I quickly realized I lacked certain apparatuses and experience. Nevertheless, I had a plan of attack.

                My plan started with research. I read about formatting, deciding on the Chicago’s Manual of Style (which made the most sense for an internship in history). I looked up tools and programs, realizing that I didn't have access to any of them (which I thought was okay since they all seemed to be superfluous aids).  Finally I queued up the audio-recording, opened a new word document, sipped my cup of coffee and began.

It did not take me very long to realize several things:

•           The audio recording devise used by celery soup is out of date and not compatible with computers which makes it difficult to adjust the speed of the audio file (so that it is easier to keep up with).
•          My lack of a foot pedal (to pause and restart the recording at will) forces me to pause the audio with my hands. This sounds incredible lazy of me. I am too lazy to reach over and press a button, but the time added to my transcription process because of this (moving my hands away from the keyboard, replacing my fingers on the keys, etc…) is significant. Perhaps as much as 25-30% of my transcription time is wasted on this simple task.
•           Transcribing takes a lot more attention and time than I originally assumed. In my head it was a much simpler task. The more time I spend transcribing, the quicker I become. When I started and was still developing my process it took an hour to complete 3 minutes of recorded audio. Now I can finish 12 minutes of recording in the same amount of time, yet I am still very slow for professional transcribers who are expected to process 15-20 minutes.
•           Transcribing an interview where I was not present will be much more complicated and difficult.

At this point I have transferred 40 minutes of the interview into a 14 page, single space script and I have 80 minutes left.

           I am still enjoying my task and excited for learning new skill set, but this undertaking has lost the first fine flush of delusional expectations.

            The picture above is taken from the back yard of the couple we interviewed, and was planted by General Sanford. I will go into more details on that in another blog entry.

A Brief Review of an Interview

This week my schedule is settling into a rhythm and I am beginning to feel comfortable with my assignments. I am working on several tasks, the first of which is:

 Interview and Transcription

        This semester my task is to direct interviews and then transcribe our interviews into Microsoft Word for future access. The staff of Celery Soup are familiar with this process of interview and transcribe. However, it has never been streamlined into a time-efficient process. So, in addition to transcribing I am in charge of writing the instruction manual for the transcription process. This manual will include the insertion of keywords for clear archival and retrieval as well as technical rules on how to treat different phrases and pauses, etc…  I believe that working on both the transcribing and the transcription guidelines simultaneously will allow me check and edit the manual in order to make the process as clean, clear, and quick as possible.

        This week I conducted my first interview, and it was a delightful experience. A week before my interview, Trish gave me a transcribed copy of her previous interview with this couple so that I would have an understanding of prior discussions. Reading through that old interview was incredibly useful since it provided an example of what Trish was expecting, helping me compose questions for my interview. On Wednesday we spent the morning with Betty and Don Reagan, Sanford Artists. Don uses the lathe to create wooden tea pots, or "tree pots" which have been sold all over the country and displayed in the Smithsonian.
       
During the interview they gave Trish and me a tour of their historic home (previously the property of General Sanford). Together we discussed their vocations, family, neighborhood, and travels for art shows.  Their lives have been quite interesting although they have always lived locally, either Sanford or Oviedo for their entire lives.

         This coming week, I will be working on transcribing the interview into a word document from the audio file and creating a transcription process. 

A New Day Means Another Awesome Opportunity

Perhaps the greatest misconception about history today is that names and dates play a central role. It isn’t. The most important thing in History the passing of pique emotions or trivial trials and defining moments. History is sharing life from one generation to the next in an intimate and memorable way. History is Storytelling. At this point I am tempted to leap into a lecture-like iteration of how and when stories have played important roles throughout history, but that is the act of a researcher, not a storyteller.

                My first history teacher knew how to paint with words. His “lectures” wove finely spun threads of folklore and fact into a fantastic tapestry. Remembering the lives which have lived parallel to our, displaced by a century or two. When you learn history like it is real (of course it is real, but very few teachers present it as though they are discussing real lives and existing souls) it has a way of arresting, fascination, and inspiring. As I say, if you do not like history, you never had a good history teacher. This teacher, and every great history mentor I have ever had has truly been a storyteller. As one well respected professor, C. S. Lewis, aptly noted in his book The Horse and His Boy: story-telling (whether the stories are true or made up) is a thing you're taught, just as English boys and girls are taught essay-writing. The difference is that people want to hear the stories, whereas I never heard of anyone who wanted to read the essays.

                Before my grandmother passed away four years ago, she gave me many stories. She never told them to me, though. She was embarrassed to talk about them, or perhaps she thought they would not interest me. Whatever the case, she passed on my heritage in the antiques she left me. Bobbles and books and gewgaws and diaries and dolls – the list is endless. Each of those items had a story to tell it has (and continues) to be my aim to seek them out and listen. Then this form of listening has led me to Celery Soup, a charming company in Sanford. Their aim is to send out listeners (or line catchers as they title them) into the community to gather what they can, to absorb what locals have to offer. Then they spin those gathered threads and weave them into plays to present back to the community. It is a perfect cycle of listening and telling which strengthens the community and demonstrates living history.

                Soon I shall be a line catcher; next week I am scheduled to conduct an interview. However, my first task has been to read through the present play (Touch and Go) and sift through prior interviews to dig up questions, ideas, and hopes to bring up in our conversation.  Throughout the semester, I will conduct several interviews, transcribe them, and identify stories which we shall incorporate into the next play. One thing I will be learning well this semester is that a mastery of storytelling and history requires significant preparation, yet is worth every effort in the end.