History 295: In Search of the Blue Nile
This student-curated exhibit follows the extraordinary journey of eighteenth-century naturalist James Bruce (1730-1794) as he endeavored to discover the source of the Blue Nile in Ethiopia. Bruce’s expedition took us through the Iberian Peninsula, the Levant, and the Barbary States, eventually leading us into Egypt, Axum, Gondar, Lake Tana and the holy streams of the Gish Abay in Ethiopia. We also explored figures that were essential both to the journey of James Bruce, as well as the history of early modern Europe and Ethiopia. These included: the fictional Prester John, Job Ludolf and Abba Gregorious, Francis Bacon, James Cook, Carl Linneaus, Comte de Buffon, Ras Maka’el, and Məntəwwab, the Dowager Empress of Ethiopia. Using the extraordinary resources in W&L’s Special Collections, including an original copy of Bruce’s “Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile” (1790), students explored topics such as early modern scientific expeditions, classification and taxonomy, print culture, race in the scientific imagination, popular geography, early museum collection and organization, and the complicated reception of Bruce’s narrative upon his return to Europe. We also worked together to recreate 18th century research methods, including constructing a camera obscura and collecting local botanical specimens on W&L’s campus.
Professor Stephanie Stillo
German 403: Independent Study
In this Fall 2013 Independent Study course, Katie Jarrell and John Bruch began The Leipziger Illustrite Zeitung Project, under the guidance of Professor Paul Youngman. This project focuses on photography and imagery in an illustrated newspaper, published in Leipzig, Germany from 1843-1944. The basis of our project was to create an online, public database of the photographs, since the LIZ is rich with interesting photos. To do this, we scanned each photograph and made an online archive using Omeka. In this digital archive, photos are tagged based on theme, location, and symbolic meaning. After completing the photo database, we also added the photos to Neatline, a digital mapping device. By choosing to color-code each photo thematically, we were able to use Neatline to view trends in the photos as they correlate to certain cities or countries. What we found was both expected and surprising. The current project focuses on the first two volumes of November 1935, although we hope to expand both the Omeka archive and the Neatline map to include many more of the available volumes.
Cantar de mio Cid (Cid)
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