anazlying a choosen textual object.

For your project in this course, you will choose an item from our Special Collections to study, or
a digitized version of an item in our Special Collections if conditions do not allow you to study
in person. You will use your knowledge from the course to write an essay of at least 8 pages
describing and analyzing your chosen text. You should use at least 3 secondary sources to aid
you in your discussion. You will also present your work to the class. You may use images in
your essay, and images are encouraged in your presentation. Essays should adhere to MLA
guidelines including citations.
Your job it to give me a history of your chosen textual object, including elements related to its
production, distribution, reception, and survival. Not all of this information may be readily
available; however, you can draw inferences based on what you observe about your object. For
instance, you may not know the exact history of a Hebrew Torah, but you can infer that one thing
that may have contributed to its survival is the use of genizahs.
Choosing your item is the first, and probably most important, step of this project. While you can
use objects from any culture and time period, you should carefully consider how much
information you can get from an object. I wouldn’t pick the first item you come across, so keep
in mind that this step will probably take some time. Because of the standardization and
mechanization of print in the 20th century, I would prefer that your item be from before 1900. •
See the “Research Help” and “Links” pages on our Canvas site for places to begin searching
for a textual object.
• Also use the resources provided by Rachel Duke from Special Collections. Reach out to her
or another librarian via the general FSU Special Collections email for help in finding or
analyzing your objects!
• For MLA help, I suggest using the Purdue OWL.
• The page count does not include use of pictures. If you do use images in the essay portion of
your project, they should be used strategically and not just to advance the page count. Eight
solid pages of writing is about 2000 words double spaced.
• Your secondary sources can be readings from the class, other readings about text
technologies, essays about the specific text you’ve found, or background information about
the time period your object is from.

Last Completed Projects