Data Mining – we do it all the time. Personally, going through George Mason’s Online Library the search for relevant topics depends on how well I decide to code the search words. I cannot complain as it makes searching for sources was less tedious than the days of old. I can only imagine utilizing the Dewey Decimal System that was prevalent in the late nineteenth century! (surely our generation would suffer) if our computers or access to the internet was taken away.

Daniel Cohen discusses this issue but his purpose is the search to refine such searching tools to give the researcher quality products instead of the massive document loads we tend to find on our searches. He first starts of using “Syllabus Finder” and this streamlines course materials into a search engine that surely relieves headaches for instructors. It is unique to witness the current dilemma of having rather easy access to a large amount of information and now trying to simplify it. This reminds me of General Meigs’ dilemma after the American Civil War where he has far too many documents and not enough room to store it.

Now we have far too may ways to access information without the tools to separate and streamline what we are looking for. I guess it’s just another challenge we will need to work through when regarding information access and retrieval. The question is what is the way forward to ensure all of this information continues to be accessible in a reasonable and easy way to find?

References:

http://www.dlib.org/dlib/march06/cohen/03cohen.html

Copyright, the protection of intellectual property. In essence it is a no brainer that an individual should be compensated for the use of their work. However, what are the limitations and guidelines that ensure the creativity and compensation is adequate and not a detriment to future works. In class we discussed the compensation rights to be 20-30 years after an artist died and incrementally it began to rise in years over the years.

I would have to argue that while the individual who created the music or book is alive they should always be compensated. Upon death, the compensation should then be a smaller percentage and upon 25 years after death no compensation. Consequently, there is a similar thing the US Government does with certain reports and investigations where they lock up the results for a significant amount of time ie. Nixon Tapes, JFK report and MLK report.

The issue is that things start to become trivial and issues will always arise when it deals with money. We have witnessed in the last few years major cases of royalty rights with the “blurred lines” and “stay with me” songs created by Robin Thicke and Sam Smith respectively. They each were charged by the public of stealing the creative rights to the song and sounding similar to the original song. As such, Robin Thicke was sent to court and ordered to pay millions of dollars in royalty and Sam Smith voluntarily (he probably knew he would lose in court) settled out of court with Tom Petty.

This really takes the fun out of enjoying the music – an artist creates a song and then we hear the backlash that takes away from the creativity of the song. Maybe that is just my weird thoughts…

Folk Music is defined as music that originates from ordinary people from a specific region which is passed from generation to generation orally. As such, the beginning of “folk music” albeit the lack of the term will undoubtedly trace back to the beginning of mankind. There is belief that the “Troubadours” that performed in cities and towns throughout the 1100’s-1600’s were the first performers of “folk music”. The unfortunate issue is that many of the works were lost or destroyed throughout history and therefore many of the historical documentation required did not survive or is no longer available.

However, throughout my recent journey of research I have found the actual word “folk music” to have it’s earliest newspaper reference was in the 1800’s. In 1870 The Evening Telegraph from Philadelphia Pennsylvania introduced the word “folk-music” in an article that was discussing the history of European art such as plays and social life. The article then attributes the history of playing folk music to Scotland and Germany and then discusses how beautiful folk music is. In 1889 The Evening Star from Washington D.C. wrote an review in there magazine for the “Swedish Ladies Concert” who sing folk-music from the Scandanivis and remarked how well the ladies sang without instruments. They then proceed to say that this concert will again be played tonight. Many articles through this time referred to folk music in the sense of Indian or Negro works that gave the listeners the opportunity to hear foreign music here at home. One article was even so bold to claim and I paraphrase that “it was strange that the only folk-music we have is from the slaves” and that was presented from “The Courier” located in Lincoln, Nebraska in 1897.

After more research that left the realm of “folk music” and the use of keywords such as of “folk” and “songs” “historical songs” I found a gem. There was a published work and was from a Russian artist Nikolay Lvov. He actually published the “Collection of Russian Folk Songs with their tunes” in the 18th Century and was sponsored by the royal government of Russia. This is important because it shows that “folk music” was real and even the government understood the  significance. The bases for folk music in the later 18th century was a discussion of nationalistic pride as Lvov attempted to present.

Towards the 19th century Americans began to not only embrace folk music of their europeans ancestors but also created their own unique folk music. As such, folk music began to remind travelers of home – especially during the civil war. There is a story that was promoted by General Winfield Hancock’s wife Almira in her book about her husband about how a song “Kathleen Mauvourneen” brought tears to General Lewis Armistead. It was said that this song reminded the old friends of better times before they would go off to serve different armies throughout the civil war.

Sources used to collect information:

Google Books
ProQuest Historical Newspapers
Chronicling America at Library of Congress

Books:

Reminiscences of Winfield Scott Hancock – Almira Hancock 1887

Magazines:

The Evening Telegraph – Philadelphia, PA 1870

The Evening Star – Washington, DC 1889

The Courier – Lincoln, NE 1897

The concept of African Americans serving as Confederates during the civil war is often considered far-reaching because of the belief that why would slaves support the Confederate cause. However, it must be understood that African Americans may have supported the cause because they were forced to or because of the possible propaganda that the Confederates may have placed toward African Americans. Therefore, Slaves may have felt that they had far to less of numbers to rebel against the Confederate forces “IF” they were armed. Also, they may have been told lies regarding how Union soldiers will receive them and may have thought that Union soldiers would commit crimes against them.

However, a greater subject of debate is whether African Americans were ever armed and fought for the Confederacy before the Confederate President Jefferson Davis made it legal in 1865. Dr. Lewis Steiner’s account has gained a lot of attention because it claims that African American’s were armed, in uniform and fought in the Battle of Antietam in 1862. There have also been various smaller claims that African American’s served as Confederates but there has been a lack of supporting documents. African Americans who have applied for a veterans pension for various states do not verify armed service but rather labels them as cooks, servants or other domestic or labor occupancies.

I therefore decided to look through several memoirs of Civil War leaders and soldiers. Some of those include Lieutenant General James Longstreet who was considered as General Robert E. Lee’s trusted war horse, Lieutenant General John Hood, Brigadier General Edward Alexander and Private Samuel Watkins. In each of these memoirs there was never any mention of any armed African Americans fighting for the Confederacy. Yet, I still refrain from saying that altogether African Americans did not serve. I believe that African Americans did fight for the Confederacy but not in organized units as I do not believe the Confederates believed the African American’s suitable to that requirement. However, I do believe that African Americans accompanied their masters on reconnaissance missions, raids and ambushes based on a individual augmentee structure.

Finally, I find it hard to believe that the organized structure of slaves into fighting units could not have been kept a secret – someone would have reported it in a battle report or one of the aforementioned memoirs. The 1800’s had limited resources to report on battles – usually through newspaper, telegraph communications and very structured photographs. The time it took to take one photo meant that oftentimes it was not practical or safe to take actual battle photos. That is also why a lot of civil war photos have been staged. Consequently, the information regarding this topic is often sparse and lacking supporting documents. In today’s world the use of hand held camera’s and social media networks close that gap that the civil war did not have the ability to.

Nick Tosches’ “where dead voices gather” is a read that I found hard to digest. This book was written with a fanatical ideology of Emmett Miller a minstrel and folk singer with a very distinct voice. As I looked up more information of Emmett Miller I found that there are quite a few people when introduced to Emmett Miller they become attracted and obsessed with this singer.

I am confused as to why. That is because his reign in the music industry was not long but yet he would go on to influence singers to include Hank Williams who is of course the father of well known country singer Hank Williams Jr. (think monday night football!). Further, the man died an alcoholic and broke so there was not any real inspiration was there? Well his voice is different and unique but he also was a minstrel singer. Could that be where the fanaticism comes from?

As such, Tosches’ discussion of minstrel shows is uncomfortable but sometimes necessary to understand. My views of the book are of little impact because I generally find no interests for Miller’s voice (not my style of music) and especially his minstrel background. However, there is good information regarding Emmett Miller’s influence (in such a short time frame) and ultimately inspiration for future musicians and of course — TOSCHES! 😉

Good Old Howlin’ Wolf! A curious and interesting character I was introduced to initially from the Cadillac Records movie and again during our most recent lecture. Howlin’ Wolf like his name was unique – rather large man with a dark complexion and a rough yet smooth voice. The reason why Howlin’ Wolf is such a great man to talk about is because he is a genuine American dream story.

Howlin’ Wolf was born into poverty in the deep south – Mississippi to be exact. He would encounter a rough life with his mother throwing him out of the house and later living shortly will an uncle who treated him badly. Eventually, Howlin’ Wolf would run away to live with his father — another unique situation as not only was life stable but that is where Howlin’ Wolf got introduced and connected with the blues.

In the years to come Howlin’ Wolf would move to Chicago and start really pushing out music and going on tours. However, he was very smart with his money even though his education level would never surpass getting a GED. In a time when many African American acts would find much success in the music industry and yet die broke and in debt is a strange and commendable. The secret is that Howlin’ Wolf lived frugally — yet still offered health insurance and good pay to his workers and not to mention he married an educated women who assisted with his business planning.

As for his name Chester Arthur Bennett is said to have got his name from his grandfather who would say that the “howling wolves would get him” if he misbehaved. Either way — I think his voice more than made up for the name. I found it very interesting that Howlin’ Wolf received a good part of class time and was impressed!

Sources:

http://www.biography.com/people/howlin-wolf-9345565#revered-by-rock-acts

Last week’s class we discussed the epidemic of the Minstrel Shows in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s. The discussion and photos of the minstrel shows were uncomfortable to me — but they were absolutely necessary to teach this lesson. After class I had to really think about the reasons I came to college and one of those reasons was to be challenged to think and understand topics that may be uncomfortable to me. However, that is a part of the learning experience and even more it helps to be educated enough to not allow something so nefarious to happen again.

Minstrel Shows to me were bound in racism and prejudice (even black people acted in these minstrel shows) — yet there was much more going on. I truly believe that some of these people really believed that this was a form of comedy. Almost as if no one took the time to really think about what they were doing but then again times were different in those years. The African American people were not held with any sort of esteem or respect. Slavery was still fresh and the reconstruction era caused widespread hatred towards the African American community. The few minstrel shows that I have watched often show black characters with very bad english, outrageous facial expressions and dim-witted acts. As such, quite possibly with the language barrier and illiteracy that most slaves had I cannot find it hard for people to find comedy in their hardships in the english spoken word.

Is there more to the Minstrel Show? The short answers is yes. Obviously there is racism, some argue that it is white people experiencing “blackness” that they couldn’t do outside of these shows. What cannot be argued is that Minstrel Shows need to a part of curriculum so that there can be awareness of this form of entertainment and the secondary and tertiary order of effects it causes. As I have stated — even now I feel uncomfortable. As with anything nefarious in the world we have a duty to educate and to ensure we never forget.

How do you REALLY feel???

In class there was a discussion about the various speeds of Internet throughout the world. The main point that was made discussed the fact that even though the United States had access to Internet before South Korea – South Korea has a far faster and superior Internet network. I can personally attest to that statement as I have lived in South Korea. The South Koreans that I met would often laugh at what us “Americans” thought was fast Internet speeds. In short – we have nothing on “Naver”.

The reason why nations like South Korea have faster Internet speeds over the US is because the US Internet structure was built decades before South Korea built theirs. As such, we move off of a slower system than South Korea. We are starting to rebuild this infrastructure through systems like Verizon Fios. The interesting fact about this is that the Internet is a tangible system with actual hardwire networks and not something invisible.

Consequently, there has been a push for wireless networks known as WiFi to become more assessable. Now, airlines such as American Airlines have provided WiFi services to their customers. This is showing just how effective and necessary Internet has become that even people on planes have the need to access it. However, these advancements do not come without it’s own security concerns. The Internet has become a source for the black-market trade, terrorist networks use the Internet to plan and execute missions and propaganda and finally nations have now established cyber warfare that is a real security concern to national security

Storing data is an issue that was discussed in class and Professor O’Malley used General Meigs issue with it after the civil war and after thought it is still very much an issue today. Consider the amount of information we encounter on a daily basis whether they are photos, videos, articles, papers and various other forms of information that inevitably requires… ahh you got it – storage!

My issue is with storage for my phone – I get notifications daily that I am at the data limit for my iPhone storage. I then proceed to save everything to my laptop, then delete off my iPhone which creates whole new storage issue on my laptop. Recently I have found online storage databases such as dropbox and google-drive – but do I really trust those? Or I have external hard-drives but even those will fill up eventually and the practicality of using 3-4 hard-drives to access your files is a bit tedious. Trust me – I have been there plugging and unplugging devices to find one item.

The results could very well be found in finding ways to make information store in smaller files (but that would have to be done by folks who are way superior in the digital arts than myself). As technology continues to grow at rapid speeds do we have the availability to meet those demands…. Otherwise what is the use if we cannot properly utilize it?

Just plain talking… does that make you feel as the pit of your stomach does during the rapid descent from a distance that would make the clouds cringe…? 😉

Learning about “Courtly” and “Plain” speaking concepts – the former being the indirect approach to conversation where individuals play with words such as in the Shakespearian era and even sometimes I found in Civil War correspondence was playful and entertaining. The latter can be attributed to the now where the attention span of individuals is often said to be less than 30 seconds where conversations are more direct and to the point. Those concepts made me think of certain aspects throughout moments in my life where without consciously thinking about it I witnessed those types of conversations.

It occurred to me that there were several times in conversations where very intelligent individuals expressed topics in a very “courtly” manner. For instance, I was at a dinner with several friends who by chance were all alums from “ivy league” schools. While I was impressed with how the words and the art in which they decided to express their thoughts and ideas – I constantly had to battle my mind to digest what exactly their aim was in the conversation. Should conversations be that “_ _ _ _” difficult? I look back and wonder why did we just dance for five minutes regarding a question that could have been asked, processed and answered within half the time it took to present it. I guess it could be a show of power regarding their education status or maybe this type of conversation was instilled upon them. Then again, maybe I just was not up to par! 😉

And yet on the other side of the spectrum – I have lost all faith in the art of communication with certain people who do not hold the slightest ability to hold a meaningful conversation. Is the ability to hold a conversation (meaning through back and forth dialogue) and the way in which we speak our thoughts two separate issues or tiers of a bigger issue? I don’t know… the “courtly” concept keeps me entertained and is interesting but it can dissuade some people from entering the conversation or even worse — the inevitable fear of “getting lost” or “keeping up” may be an issue. Conversely, the “plain” concept if not careful could be far too bland and definitely will and has (I’m a victim) lead to awkward silences.

I guess awkward silences are good — if you are a reporter. I remember the famous reporter Mike Wallace saying something to the tune of how he would ask questions and then when the interviewees would answer he would then give around 4-5 seconds of silence. He found that often times they would divulge more information due to the awkward silence that ensued. That’s pretty “plain” and direct to me.

Either way — There is room for both in moderation. I even think it would be great if people could flow back and forth between “courtly” and “plain” conversations. Some would call this “wit”…

Thoughts?