I already knew a bit about the 1930’s because I took AP US History in high school so I remember a lot of the new deal and of the great depression. However in class we never went over the impact of specific programs because to go over every single one would take too much time but we went over how the programs help the United States overall. I’m very interested in seeing how promoting the arts will help stimulate not only the economy but also enrich the lives of Americans through these difficult times. I haven’t worked a lot in digital history although I am very invested in learning history so I’ve researched different periods in history for specific groups of people before. I’m nervous that I’ll have difficulty in certain areas like trying to find information on specific ideas or groups because I’m not sure how much was recorded in that time period. Overall I’m excited to be in this class and I think it will be engaging while also pushing the boundaries of what I’ve thought before.
I was assigned the project “Musical Passages” which plays the first transcribed African music in the Caribbian. This music was written down in 1707 by Hans Sloane who wrote a book called “Voyage to the Islands of Madera, Barbados, Nieves, S. Christophers, and Jamaica” and the music tells the stories of slaves. The first thing you hear when you open up the page is the ocean, and then suddenly different kinds of music play from different areas, but all with the sound of the ocean in the background so you feel as though you’re listening on a boat or by the sea. At the bottom it explains what Sloane wrote about, the different types of African music in the Caribbian, and it also breaks down each piece that they play while you’re listening to them. This project was created to share the story and music of the slaves whose stories are often forgotten and spoken over. Musical Passages gives the listener a sense that they’ve gone back in time and if you close your eyes, you’re practically transported. It is interactive as well because the listener can click on the music they want to hear. The set up makes you slow down and really interact with a different time period in a way we’re often not able to do.
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I also took AP U.S. History during my junior year of high school, but I completely forgot that we had learned about this era. I agree to the fact that we would’ve never even remotely had the time to cover all of the projects of the New Deal. I think now that we’re in a college course that focuses solely on this time period and these specific projects, we can further and fully learn about them, and give all of their contributors their rightful praise.
Your digital project sounds really interesting – especially since it documents a group of people that do not often get talked and celebrated enough for their artistic perseverance and creativeness in a time where they were being enslaved.
The project you reviewed is super interesting! I love that they make the music accessible, and how they break things down so that you can get an almost hands-on kind of experience while learning about the meanings of different pieces of music.