[Sca-cooks] I'm back! (Be afraid? :-/ )

[Alex Clark]

Hola! I'm back after several years' absence. I don't know how long I'll be 
on the list--as usual, it seems that while it's for SCA cooks, it's not as 
often for SCA cookery.

When I unsubscribed, I sent a reminder that has seemingly been forgotten. 
I'll restate it (at more length) so that it can be forgotten again.

"To redact" means to give composed form to content, either by giving a new 
form to content derived from one or more pre-existing compositions, or by 
putting one's thoughts into a composed form (typically a written document). 
It specifically does not mean to create any kind of content whatsoever, 
including interpretive content. One may both redact from other sources and 
give interpretations thereof within the same document, but if that document 
is supposed to be a "redaction" then the redacted parts should be distinct 
from the interpretations.

"Redact" (and words derived therefrom, especially "redaction") as typically 
used here are ill-chosen and nearly useless jargon, and no number of 
instances of misuse will make them correct. These are among the few words 
(such as "irony") that should not be messed with. These words belong to the 
literati, and are nothing but buzzwords to the many who don't know their 
correct meanings. Since it is interpretations of period recipes (even if 
those interpretations are not yet written) that are being called 
"redactions" this word is in effect being used as a substitute for a more 
correct word: "interpretation." You can only really redact a period recipe 
if the changes that you make are in its form rather than in its content. So 
in _Curye on Inglysch_, where variations from different MSS of _The Forme 
of Cury_ are given in the footnotes, *that* is a redaction of period 
recipes. When (as usually happens in interpreting period recipes) 
measurements or methods or cooking times/temperatures, etc. are added, the 
resulting interpretation is no more a redaction of a period recipe than a 
dog's tail is a leg. When written, it is only a redaction of the modern 
writer's interpretation.

So please, for the sake of clarity and especially accuracy, let's call 
interpretations what they are, and not bandy about words like "redaction" 
that are not really in the vocabularies of most SCA cooks. Especially since 
redacting period recipes is far more than modern cooks really accomplish 
with most of their interpretations thereof. In these cases, using a word 
like "redact" lends a false semblance of authoritativeness to something 
that actually contains a significant amount of guesswork.

I don't mean to say that the word "redact" doesn't have some importance on 
this list. It does have one real use: as jargon, it's a way for people to 
proclaim their conformity with the in-group. That's okay as long as one is 
being misled by the rest of the group. But for now I'm here to say (with 
occasional reminders in the future) that most modern cooking and 
recipe-writing from period sources is interpretation, not redaction. Please 
don't be misled by those who don't yet know this.

Henry of Maldon/Alex Clark

P. S. When you discuss cuskynoles, send a Cc to Voldemort. Maybe he'd like 
to share his opinions.