While figuring out how to organize my thoughts for this blog post, I read through my classmates’ thoughts on Tuesday’s presentations and was amused to see Aidan express jealousy (however slight) for those of us attempting more \u201ccreative routes\u201d in our final projects. I had been concerned that my unconventional\u2013one might say wacky\u2013approach to the project paled in comparison to the more official, traditionally academic pursuits of my peers. In particular, Sherwood’s use of mapping and Avery’s social network site struck me as emulating projects we have studied in class. Despite encouragement from Dr. Shrout, I still came away slightly nervous that my undertaking is too \u201cout there.\u201d<\/p>\n

The main source of my worry concerns my ability to present a clear historical argument in my podcast. I want to smoothly integrate my argument into the podcast without clearly defining it as a \u201cthesis,\u201d but I also don’t want the argument to get lost in the anecdotes and dramatic flair of the program. Another challenge I anticipate is to write the podcast with a tone serious enough so that historical arguments do not sound out of place in the dialogue, but dramatic enough that it doesn’t sound like an essay read aloud.<\/p>\n