Lab Report: Commonplace Books

For this final Lab Report, you will provide some information about your semester-long activity of keeping a commonplace book. At the outset of this adventure, you were advised to add at least 6 entries per week to your commonplace book. We looked at examples Links to an external site. for organizing your pages, even creating a running index. As we exchanged books throughout the semester, many of you noted the logical sequence of organization while others noted that space dictated abandoning that logic.

For this Lab Report, begin by defining the commonplace book based on "Cultures of the Commonplace

• Based on Price's article, is your commonplace book meant for private or public consumption?
• Did you organize the material for this private or public consumption? How so?
• How is your commonplace book organized? (Be explicit with this response) -- include a photo (or more than 1!) of your commonplace book
• What particular facet of your commonplace book is most helpful to you and why?
• Did your thought process change as you kept your commonplace book?
• How many times have you re-read the information in your commonplace book?
• Did the topics of information shift over time? How so?
• Are the topics of your commonplace book gendered? (See Price's article for help on this one.)
• How does your commonplace book participate in bookmaking? (See Price's final argument.)

Don't answer these questions individually. Instead, use these questions as a launch point for your report.

At the beginning of the May 9 or the May 24 class session, submit your commonplace book to Prof. Harris for review. You'll get your book back before the end of class. Without the submission of your commonplace book for review, this lab report will receive a zero.