Monday, July 27, 2020
By:
When I accepted the SPS internship initially, I had no conception of a virtual internship. The whole summer has been one of learning how to navigate the remote working situation. Don’t get me wrong, there are some serious positives that I have mentioned in previous blogs (time with family before I move, time outdoors in beautiful Utah, certain flexibilities, and more). Furthermore, I am beyond grateful for the opportunity to still be completing this internship. But there are also difficulties. I mentioned the challenge of doing historical research without physical books in a past blog post, and it still rings true this week. When I did historical research in undergrad, I would often go to my university’s library and leave with a bag or two of books (and I mean full bags) and look through relevant chapters. It is relatively easy to flip through a book and get a sense for it, and I quite simply prefer that to searching through a PDF. I will concede that ctrl + f makes looking for a word or section much easier, and the ease of access is great, but I will take reading a book over an e-book any day.
No online scan can give you the feel or smell of a book, or a full sense of its rarity or age. I was looking forward to walking around bookshelves, taking in a new library. I think all of these things came to head this week because the nature of the outreach I am doing for the Niels Bohr Library and Archives (NBLA) is simply different that many of the interns in this position before me. Last year, the history intern made a physical exhibit, showcasing library materials. I have been considering how to showcase the work I have down and NBLA resources I have used differently. I started out with many ambitions and now have a better sense for what is possible in the next two weeks. I will be focusing in on blogging, and have been working on that for the last week.
So yes, I am now blogging about blogging. I love interdisciplinary approaches, and I think one of the strongest ways to combine history and physics is to bring the narrative of the humanities to the wonder of the universe. So, I am working on a piece that tells a story of the fundamental forces using the extensive digital visual collections of NBLA. Is I conduct my work, I look forward to when I can see the NBLA. I have a better sense of what I want to see if I do make it to Washington D.C., instead of the relative ignorance I would have showed up with on Day 1 had we been in person.
Maria Stokes