![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Oct. 19th, 2005 03:05 pmARGH!
My dissertation is on nineteenth century women in the USA moving west. Having looked at stuff in general, my supervisor told me to limit it and basically just to look at the southern states as they have been less analysed - ie to put aside the "wagon trains" and "oregon trail" and so on in favour of a look at the plantation women and slaves and so on. While I was pissed off at first, given that I found the northern stuff interesting, I took her point and became fascinated by the sneaky glimpses I could find of stuff in the south.
Problem. Very little primary source material. Basically I haven't got enough letters and journals and so on on which to base my work. Not digitalised and published ones anyway. And I have neither the money nor the time to fly out to Alabama or whatever.
So now she's saying, unless I can find more material, I'll have to look at the northern wagon trains. As it is I'm now a quarter of the way through the time I have to write this. How can I change now?
Sorry, that was a rant, but I could really do with some advice. Actually, I could do with one of you saying "ah but there's a fabulous collection of women's letters here..." but I'm being realistic.
EDIT: Now that I'm calmer, I'll be clearer. The problem is that I'm working on the migration from the coastal southern states to inland (Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee...) in the 1830s and 40s. I'm having trouble locating primary sources because I'm in the UK so they need to be online, on microfilm or published.
My dissertation is on nineteenth century women in the USA moving west. Having looked at stuff in general, my supervisor told me to limit it and basically just to look at the southern states as they have been less analysed - ie to put aside the "wagon trains" and "oregon trail" and so on in favour of a look at the plantation women and slaves and so on. While I was pissed off at first, given that I found the northern stuff interesting, I took her point and became fascinated by the sneaky glimpses I could find of stuff in the south.
Problem. Very little primary source material. Basically I haven't got enough letters and journals and so on on which to base my work. Not digitalised and published ones anyway. And I have neither the money nor the time to fly out to Alabama or whatever.
So now she's saying, unless I can find more material, I'll have to look at the northern wagon trains. As it is I'm now a quarter of the way through the time I have to write this. How can I change now?
Sorry, that was a rant, but I could really do with some advice. Actually, I could do with one of you saying "ah but there's a fabulous collection of women's letters here..." but I'm being realistic.
EDIT: Now that I'm calmer, I'll be clearer. The problem is that I'm working on the migration from the coastal southern states to inland (Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee...) in the 1830s and 40s. I'm having trouble locating primary sources because I'm in the UK so they need to be online, on microfilm or published.
