Firearms Historian

RM Vivas · #1 06-01-2023, 12:05 PM

I meant to post this in January but it wound up sitting on my desktop until I finally got to it.

The Practicum in Digital History kicked my butt and sucked up a lot of my time that might otherwise have been spent burning bandwidth here.

Some observations:

As of 17DEC22 I finally completed the requirements for a BA in History from SUNY-Albany. Yay me!

Now I’m on to my MA in Public History.

I had a choice between an MA in History and one in Public History. The History MA is 30 credits and the Public History MA is 36. The main difference is that for the Public History MA, one needs 6 credits of internship (at a rate of 50 hours of internship = 1 credit; total 300 hours internship).

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Group A: Academic Content Courses
(18- 21 credits)
Geographic and thematic courses in History, including one reading course
Research Seminar

Group B: Public History Courses
(9-12 credits)
His 501 Introduction to Public History

And other courses selected from the following:
Introduction to Historical Agency Management and Practice
Curatorial Practices for Historical Agencies
Interpretation of Historic Sites and Artifacts
History Museums
Material Culture Studies
Introduction to Historic Preservation
Practicum in Oral/Aural History
Practicum in Digital History
Practicum in Historical Documentary Filmmaking
Practicum in Historical Narrative

Students must complete a minimum of 30 credits of coursework chosen from Group A and B as apportioned plus a supervised internship for 6 credits.

Internship in Public History

Major Field Exam:
Satisfactory completion of a major field examination covering academic and public history course content.
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The choice of Public History seemed more suited for what I wanted. It’s not my intention to teach (although Mrs. Vivas thinks I should). My chasing after this MA is so that I can write better about firearms history.

Also, as I look around my office and my hard drives, I realize that I have come into possession of a great deal of data that needs to be sorted, preserved and made available to other collectors.
I have ideas for advancing the academic/research side of our hobby (religion?) and a Public History degree may help me to put those ideas into action.

I thought it might be interesting to document the quest for the MA in Public History, so I’m posting this message and plan to periodically update it as the process plays out. I’m thinking that along the way, as I delve deeper into the courses on research resources and techniques, I might be able to pass those along so others who are looking to expand their research skills.

There is a fellow whose tagline on his posts states that he prefers to be called a collector because it sounds better than a hoarder. Funny, but it has some validity. As a collector, we don’t just accumulate firearms but we also look into their history and what makes them valuable (not necessarily in a monetary sense) to us.

Anyway, enough pontificating.

Classes start 18JAN23. I‘m signed up for two 3-credit classes:
AHIS 509 - Intro to Historic Preservation 18JAN23 - 02MAY23
An overview of the field of historic preservation, emphasizing the history, evolution, and application of its programs. Significant areas, such as the history of the preservation movement, historic preservation laws and their application, and the identification, evaluation, registration, and protection of historic resources will be discussed.

AHIS 596 - Practicum in Digital History 18JAN23 - 02FEB23
This course introduces students to the practice of history in the digital age. It focuses on how the Internet and digital technologies and software have reshaped public and academic history presentation platforms and venues -- as well as historical research strategies and tools. As a hands-on course, it will teach students the fundamentals of digital history. Areas of concentration will vary depending on the instructor but will include such topics as: narrative and hypertext theory and practice, digital imaging and visualizations, primary- and secondary-source databases, wikis, blogs, augmented reality, digital mapping, virtual museums, historical gaming, GIS and digital mapping, audio and video media processing and editing, and more.