Friday, June 29, 2012

Week 4: "...in somewhat good condition."

This was a short week at the internship since I am now working three days at the Archives (my normal job where I get paid) and three days at NMAI. The reason being is they decided not to give me enough to live without pay for three months. Although it's kind of a let that I don't get as much time to work on the ledger project. Hopefully things will work out. Also I was completely on my own this week, as Kara went on a two week vacation but I have managed so far. She is going to have a laundry list of questions when she gets back!

Onward to Wednesday 6/27...
I started out the day by adding new sites to some of the records I had entered last week. The locality section of the ledger tells me where certain specimens were found or excavated and I have to put that information into the "Sites" section of the record. All of the sites are created by one person: the supreme site creator, now on known as Pat the Site Master. She is one of the Collections Manager at the CRC. Apparently, she knows everything about sites. Sometimes the location in the ledger has not been created in the database and I have to send her an e-mail to create that site. I also added the completed records into a group for easy access.

Since I had 50 new records created by the record maker (Heather, the record maker), I continued on my way deciphering old hand writing/spelling and entering the ledger information into the database. Some of the information is very tricky to figure out. Thanks to my amazing deduction skills, I've been doing fairly well so far. Found out that the Cibunez tribe, as it is spelled in the ledger, is actually the Ciboney tribe. They hail from the Caribbean. Eventually I did run out of records. I contacted the record maker to make more but she was in training. So I had to start on those pesky measurements again!

Thursday 6/28
Just when I thought all of the kinks were worked out. The record maker had to send in a curve ball. I tried to explain to her why I needed so many more records to be made but apparently she didn't understand the situation. Simply put I need more records when I have completed the ones I can and eventually go back to the ones that I am suppose to skip for now. This is sort of my job. Well no deal on that table and she was giving me a fuss. So I went to Ann the Curator, told her the situation, and she sorted the problem out. Now I get records in batches of 100 when requested!

I find some of the bone descriptions quite hysterical sometimes when I read them. Cranium - dirty yellowish, brownish...I'm trying to picture this color but all I get is weird poop brown images in my head. Next it will mention some parts of the face or skull that is "defective", broken, or gone. Even if half the skull was gone it will still be described as "in somewhat good condition" or "fairly well preserved." Not really sure what this information was used for because the descriptions are clearly subjective.

A new place I learned about is Jauco, Cuba, a small coastal village. New tribe names: Neutrals and Kwakiutl in Canada, Conestogans in Pennsylvania, and Taino-Arawak in the Caribbean.

Lastly, there was a potluck at the CRC on Thursday for someone who was leaving. That means free food! Someone had brought in a huge crock pot full of chili, which was amazing!

Friday 6/29
Continued entering ledger information into EMu. I was able to get to record #125 today! Most of the specimens I entered today were from the collection of Dr. Joseph L. Jones, a renowned physician from Louisiana. Also ran into other GWU interns at the Museum Support Center cafeteria at lunch today!

Next week, I look forward to going to the Folklife Festival and 4th of July festivities. Hopefully more pictures!

Friday, June 22, 2012

Week 3: DPAL and Choctaw

Tuesday 6/18
The project I am taking on is inputting information about human remains specimens from a physical anthropology ledger book from 1915 - 1930. Here is some information about the ledger:

In the early days of the Museum of the American Indian, the founder and main collector, George Gustav Heye, created the Department of Physical Anthropology (DPAL) to hold human remain specimens. The specimens were given to the museum from prominent anthropological scholars for research. At that time many physical anthropologists and archaeologists excavated Native American mounds and burial sites and took the remains for "scholarly research." The remains given to the museum were recorded into a catalog ledger. Eventually the DPAL was closed from lack of use and the remains were transferred to other museums and universities. The majority of them went to the NYU School of Dentistry.

The records that were written in the ledger were photocopied and put into a notebook. The notebook is what I am now using to input the information into the NMAI collections database.

Last Friday I went through the notebook and tried to decipher what I would call the "bone code." I call it the bone code because for each specimen the name of the bone(s) are abbreviated with a number or the part of the bone (if in a series) proceeding the abbreviation.

On Tuesday, I organized the notes that I wrote down to make a key for the ledger bone code. For the rest of the day I worked on entering more South American collection measurements into the database. The objects were more textiles such as bark cloths, women's skirts, and dance outfits. Near the end of the day, I finally got the instructions for entering the project into the database. The instructions consisted mostly of the fields I would be using and the specific information to enter into those fields.

Wednesday 6/19
I went to the Choctaw Days event at NMAI. I had a good time. At the even I was able to get a small glimpse into the Choctaw culture. They had information tables on food, native tools, flutes, pottery, basket making, beadwork, the Choctaw school of language, stick ball, and so much more. The main theme of the event was to celebrate the Choctaw code talkers of World War I. I was also able to talk to a few people about how they made baskets! In the activity center, there were stations to make Choctaw crafts such as corn husk dolls and beaded choker or bracelet. I chose to make a bracelet. I also got a cute airbrushed turtle tattoo!

Above is a picture of some of the baskets at the event. The diamond pattern is important and prominent pattern in Choctaw crafts and clothing. They use this pattern to show respect to the rattlesnake.

In the afternoon, there were performances by a Choctaw flute player and dancers. Below is one of social dances they performed call the "Raccoon Dance."

Thursday and Friday 6/20-6/21
For the rest of the week I started working on ledger entries, testing the instructions, and making changes where necessary by noting any problems or concerns. I also numbered the copied ledger pages. I did about the first 20 specimens in the notebook because about 10 or so were crossed out and replaced, which is another problem we have to tackle later.

Afterwards, I cleaned up the records with the approved revisions from Kara and the revisions were added to the main entry instructions as well. For most of the day on Friday I went back to inputting those darn measurements again because I didn't have any records to enter information. (There is someone else who creates the record and I just put in the information. There were also only 20 records made for the week and the record maker was out of the office.) So more measurements!
Some of the textiles were from the Quechua peoples of Cuzco, Peru.
Link for more info on Quechua.



Friday, June 15, 2012

Week 2: Time to get to work!

For the remainder of the internship, I have decided to do weekly blog entries that captures the main points of the entire week. Unless something really amazing happens then I will post right away!

Tuesday 6/12
In the morning I restarted the Events entry that I was trying to start last Friday but failed. I was trying to put in sections of the exhibit but was not able to add them to the "Look up List" in EMu. Look up Lists are set list of words/terms, which can be added to if needed, and used for certain fields. Kara helped me create the exhibit sections for the event and all was well again. I was able to finish the entry without any other problems.

After lunch, I was given my next temporary task: a one inch binder full of old measurements to enter into EMu. The measurements were done prior to the Museum of the American Indian's big collection move from NY to DC in 1993. All of the measurements were done in 3-dimensions instead of 2-dimensions so I had ignore the height and go with the width and the depth. Most of the objects I was entering measurement for were textiles so I'm not sure why they were measured in 3-D. It's a mystery! Luckily the majority of the objects had catalog numbers that I could easily find in the database. For the rest of the day, I looked up the catalog number of the objects in the notebook and put in measurements where necessary.

Wednesday and Thursday 6/13-6/14
For the next two day I was working on the measurement notebook. Each section of the notebook was divided by "storage vault" name from the old MAI storage facility. I started working on the "Boatroom Vault." This section contained mostly woven plant/natural textiles such mats, rain capes, etc. from various cultures. The "Boatroom" was short and I finished in a few hours. The next section was the "South American Vault." This section contained mostly garment textiles such as shirts, whole and parts. There were also some pants, ceremonial outfits, and coconut fiber cloths just to name a few.
A large amount of the shirts and shirt parts were collected from the Kuna people indigenous to Panama and Colombia. The shirts are called molas and are the traditional garment worn by women. The shirts are made by sewing panels of fabric together. There were so many shirts and panels! They were fascinating to look at, very colorful and intricately made. Most had traditional designs and some had contemporary animal motifs. As I was going through the catalog and looking at the shirts, I realized I actually have a shirt panel made by the Kuna from Panama! I was fascinated to have discovered that I have something similar to what was in the museum. I almost feel like a collector!

Check out the links to learn more about molas and see the one that I have:
About Molas
More about Molas
My Kuna mola picture

At the end of the day on Thursday, I finally got the notebook to start my project!

Friday 6/15
Today was the day for a plethora of free coffee, doughnuts, and bagels! yum!
In the morning, I went to the beginning of a digitization mini-conference at NMAI then left for the intern/staff meet and greet, which was up on the next floor.
The mini-conference was called 15 Years Digitizing the Smithsonian: Projects Supported by the CIS IRM Pool. The CIS IRM Pool (Collections Information System - Integrated Resource Management) supports collections management and outreach by funding digitization efforts at the Smithsonian. The conference was put together by my supervisor Kara and I got to hear about different digitization projects from many of the Smithsonian museums such as the Natural History Museum, Air and Space and Freer/Sackler (Asian Collection). I also learned about Digital Asset Management Systems or DAMS and archival systems such as Archivist Toolkit, DACS and EAD.
The intern/staff meet and greet was nice. I got in late so not many people were left but I did get to hear a native drum song, which welcomed the interns to the museum. Then I talked to a few people and all of the interns had pictures taken.
Afterwards, I went back to mini-conference with fellow interns Kelly, who I work with in collections information, and Elliot, who works in archives to finish up the afternoon.

After lunch, I went back to the CRC to get a head start on Phase I of my project!

Next week: the exciting project details!

Friday, June 8, 2012

Day 4: Advanced Emus and Star Gods

I didn't do a whole lot today. So I will skip the boring details.

In the morning, I read two data standard guides. One on how to edit catalog information and the other about creating what they call "Parties" records. Parties records are used to link information about people, organizations, data sources, or delegations that are related to the objects. Really exciting stuff but important nonetheless.

Lunch...I like lunch. Plus I get to socialize with the other interns.

In the afternoon, I got a quick "advanced" training session from Kara. She basically showed me the records I would be editing and creating and the fields I would be using the most. For the human remains (HR) project, I will be creating all new records in the database and linking some to existing HR in the NMAI collection! I am a little bit nervous but hopefully after some practice I will go in with more confidence to not mess anything up.

After the training and with about half an hour left in the work day, I got my first small project. For this project I am entering a new "Event" record into the database and linking objects in the collection to the event. Events are things like past/current exhibits, publication, or anything where the collections were used for a specific purpose. The event that I am creating a record for is an exhibit that was set up at the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) in 1982 called the "Star Gods of the Ancient Americans." Collections of the NMAI were loaned for this exhibit and will be linked to the event. (added a link for more information)

I started the project but I guess the database didn't agree with the terms I was supposed to be using. That problem will have to wait until Tuesday.


About KE-EMu
  

Thursday, June 7, 2012

Day 3: Training Emus?

Today I trained emus!  What, emus? Where?

Nope. Sorry there weren't any real emus at work today.

Although, it was a very long and mentally exhausting day. I got in the CRC around 8:30am, which means my new wake-up time is 6:15am instead of 7am. Ugh! Luckily that means I get off work at 4:30pm!

I didn't have much to do until 10:30am, which was when the database training started. So I ended up killing time by doing the mandatory and oh-so exciting Computer Safety Awareness training and performing random searches on the database.

For the rest of the day I was trained on the KE-EMu collections database, which consisted mostly of me staring at a computer and listening to some guy talk about how to used the basic functionality of the system. Basically, how to log-in, what fields each module contains, how to perform searches using objects, culture names, people, etc, and how to create a report. Most of it I had already figured out but he went over some things again for the other people in the training session. The training was good, although not terribly exciting and stimulating, and the instructor was very thorough. Sometimes he was a little too thorough and went off on tangents.

I also got this neat Emu Ahead keychain for completing the training along with a lanyard and a pen!

Tomorrow looks like it's going to be another uneventful morning. How many ways can I look up Choctaw baskets in the database? More fiddling, I see. Then in the afternoon I will have advanced emu training!

Wednesday, June 6, 2012

Day 2: I'm official now!

On the second day, I went to the Smithsonian security office to get my super cool intern ID. I can now enter any Smithsonian facility without going through bag check and I get a 20% discount on food and merchandise. Oh yeah!

Then I walked to the Museum shuttle pick up area to wait for the shuttle. Waiting feels like forever sometimes! The shuttle finally came to pick me up to go out to the CRC.

At the CRC, I met my supervior Kara. She showed me my desk, gave me some information about getting my e-mail and we worked out schedule. She also explained the project that I will be working on. The details for now: I am working in the Collections Information Systems department (CIS) and the Collections Research and Documentation unit. I will be entering data into the NMAI's collections database KE-EMu. From what Kara told me, I will be working in conjunction with the Repatriation department to research and help figure out how to input a collection of human remains into their database. I will explain in more about the project later when I start working on it. 

For the rest of the day it was mostly making sure the technology was working like the phone, e-mail, and the database. I also went through the book of a training manual and played around with the database in order to get familiar with it. Well it's like I had anything better to do.

There will be no posts for Wednesday this week because I was working at the Archives. Thursday I will be back at CRC for KE-EMu database training!

Day 1: Orientation

I decided to do a blog to tell of my time as an intern at the National Museum of the American Indian. I hope you will follow along and enjoy finding out all of the neat and exciting experiences that may happen during my time at the Museum!

On the first day of my internship, I met the other National Museum of the American Indian (NMAI) interns and the internship coordinator, Jill, outside of the Museum around 9 am. Once everyone was gathered and checked in at the security desk, we went to the conference room for an introduction to the Museum, events, and general things to expect during our time working in the Museum. We also had Dunkin Doughnuts!

Next we took the shuttle to NMAI's collection storage facility called the Cultural Resource Center (CRC). Here Jill lead the group around to the different departments at the CRC and introduced us to various intern supervisors. Some of the departments at the CRC are Collections Management, Research, Archives, and Repatriation. Then Jill gave us a tour of some of NMAI's collections from all over the world. The majority of the objects are from the private collection of George Gustav Heye.

After finishing up at the CRC, we took the shuttle back to the Museum for lunch. We ate in the NMAI's Mitsitam cafe. It's a little pricey there so it took a while to find something worth eating. I decided on the buffalo burger. It sounded good at the time and I was starving! Unfortunately the burger was a little on the mediocre and not-really-worth-my-money side but the guava agua fresca was amazing!

Lunch went by pretty fast. I mean, when you are having fun grossing people out (especially vegetarians) with weird food customs, you tend to loss track of time!

After lunch, Jill lead us around to other department at the Museum and introduced us to more intern supervisors.

Then to wrap up the busy day, Jill gave us a brief tour of the current Museum exhibits and explained the meaning behind each of them.

Although it was a very exhausting day, I enjoyed seeing the Museum facilities and meeting new people.