I met with the St. Mary’s College of Maryland Research Librarian on January 31st. The meeting was extremely influential in helping me to get my research started. As I mentioned in my previous blog post, I was always looking for the right answer. After taking a minute to stop looking for the right answer, and just look at everything available, I know now more than before what this research phase means.
The research that I do now is the foundation for the success of this final project. The St. Mary’s Librarian started off with many of the sources that I had already known were available to me, but one thing that she said seemed to stick out the most. She referenced an old newspaper that was from the area. Could this paper have covered The Song of Solomon? That question began to burn in my mind, so off I went to research and find this paper, searching for the title of my book, but came up empty. Maybe change how or what I am searching for? Censorship, maybe that would do the trick? Still nothing, after continuing the search and expanding the terms I decided it would be best to move away from this source.
The Librarian also gave us another newspaper, called the Enterprise. I started off the search and was amazed at how much there was. There was a wave of primary source information that I needed to sift through. Source after source I was more and more involved and convinced that The Song of Solomon was going to be the most controversial book ever written in the United States. I saw how the people of St. Mary’s county reacted to this, but how did other people not in the county react? My next step will be to research how much of a stir this book caused in other places in the country.
Now that I have a good foundation of research from the Enterprise, I will need to contact the St. Mary’s library research librarian and see if they know anything that could help expand my view on the book. I also need to check the book out from the school’s library, every time I set a day to pick up the book I forget to search through the catalog and find the book number. Reading the book and trying to think like a parent or school teacher will be a valuable research.
Overall, I believe that I am on a successful path to completing my base research. Once I have completed a search for local primary sources I will expand my research to the greater context of the United States. I hope to accomplish this before the midpoint of the semester so that way I can move into the latter half well prepared to craft my argument about the book. It will take time, dedication, and hard work, but my partner and I can take on anything.