[Sca-cooks] Sca-cooks Digest, Vol 76, Issue 23

[Philip Troy / G. Tacitus Adamantius]

On Tue, 2012-08-14 at 12:04 -0700, Aldyth wrote:

> Message: 6
> Date: Tue, 14 Aug 2012 11:59:37 -0600
> From: Deborah Hammons <mistressaldyth at gmail.com>
> To: Cooks within the SCA <sca-cooks at lists.ansteorra.org>
> Subject: [Sca-cooks] Documentation, was Bullpucky

> So the fella needing a notarized note from God will likely need someone
> else to notarize the note saying God actually signed it.  Loosing
> proposition.

I just got through talking with the person who, it has been alleged,
advocated the notarized copies of primary source documentation. It has
been suggested that the words of that person were seriously
misunderstood, filtered, as might be easily understandable, through the
clogged ears of a disappointed and unreceptive listener. All I can say
is I've known the guy and brewed with him for over 20 years, and his
idea of documentation is almost identical to mine, which is pretty much
the same as yours quoted below.

If you make something, show how it relates to how people would, or
might, have made something functionally or substantially similar in
period with a view to expanding people's understanding of how people
lived in our period. Explain the process, giving examples from some
known period source. Primary preferred, but secondary, tertiary, etc.,
cool if suitably identified as such and the best one can do. Explain how
the process you applied was the same, or different, from the process in
your documentation (i.e. "in the original they parboiled the meat and
then chopped it, I used ground beef from the supermarket because it was
on sale, so the texture may be different"). Discuss possible
ramifications of those differences. "The texture may be different."

"Duchess So-and-So uses it in her mead, and she's a really great
brewer"? That's not going to carry much weight unless Her Grace is a lot
older than she looks. And she looks great. I'm just saying.

It is not rocket science; it's just that some people are emotionally
invested in the idea that this constitutes some unreasonably heavy
academic labor. It's in the charter we're into the education thing,
right? But what was described is something no PhD candidate could be
asked to do, let alone an SCA A&S Competition entrant. It is not
happening, has not happened, will not happen.
> 
> I really like the "easy" documentation explaination that my better half
> gives his students.  Tell me how they did it.  Tell me how you did it.  If
> there are differences in how they did and how you did, tell me what they
> are and why.  And put that in writing.  Run it through a spelling and
> grammar check.  Pick a format.
> 
> I wish all things seemed that simple.

Amen. 

Phil, stealing a moment from real-world academia to be Adamantius