Nova Scotia Memories - Folklore of the St. Marys

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Therefore, perhaps names of the fashions women wore while riding provided Sarah with a kind of commonplace upon which she could firmly base and centre her learning. Similarly, for Maureen, who was quite artistic and a good photographer, the central organizing concept seems to have been the pervasive evidence of excess throughout Victorian design. For Jennifer, I think the commonplaces were somewhat paradoxically double-sided.

Her central themes focused on gingerbread as a consumer item subject to design and selection by the individual, and the process of construction. From her writing, it is apparent that the steps involved in making of gingerbread trim seemed at odds with the expectation that the customer would be encouraged to specify a design at all, since using the large steam powered machines to turn out unique pieces was so time- and labour-intensive.

As Jennifer wrote in her report:. Machines in the nineteenth century were steamed powered and the machines we used today to make trim are electric powered. The machines at the Sutherland Steam Mill were large and not movable, you would move the wood through the machines to cut out your designs, but today the tools are smaller and more compact so you can move the tools around the wood to cut out your piece. I wondered if she enjoyed, or would enjoy, cycling, and whether that is what attracted her to the topic in the first place.

I was somewhat surprised to find out that Sarah did not like cycling at all, at least not as a leisure activity. She tried to learn when she was younger, but fell and then abandoned any further attempts.

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Upon reflection, I was reminded of other ethnographic moments where I encountered individuals who did not necessarily like all — or any — aspects of the traditional culture they performed or understood as tradition bearers. As Smith observes, desire or value function on personal as well as social levels, and desirable, compelling, or significant traditions, experiences or other stimuli need not be pleasant For Sarah, cycling was not pleasant, but studying how Victorian women mastered the new sport clearly was.

The clothing that women cyclists wore made something that was slightly dangerous and extremely unladylike not only possible, but also popular. It is possible that, even though Sarah did not enjoy cycling herself, she found pleasure in these Victorian expressions of female resistance. I sensed that this could be difficult to study in the context of Shand House, because other than a box of glass ornaments in the attic, there was little material or written evidence of how Christmas at Shand House was celebrated.

To compensate for this, Lori was very interested in looking at any books on the subject, and she was also quite adept at Internet searches. Lori described herself as an avid genealogist. She mentioned that one of her hobbies was the identification and collection of Victorian dolls, and she enjoyed almost every aspect of material culture and decoration from the Victorian era.

At our second meeting, we went to the West Hants Historical Society Museum, and Lori was able to identify and date many of the dolls in that collection, and detail some of their defining features. From the beginning, Lori appeared enthusiastic and cheerful, and she attended every Friday, despite having to deal frequently with illness and significant family stresses.

I find it interesting that her topic took her outside the house altogether on her research journey.

People work memories and objects together in their lives in ways that allow them to actively create traditions, respond to change by weaving narratives around objects and endowing them with new meanings, and by using things to give new substance to events and moments of loss in their lives. It became clear that the main challenge for Lori was learning how to narrow topics and focus her efforts around a particular set of research questions. Nicholas, the first Christmas tree, and so on. She alluded to this challenge to her learning in the questionnaire.

When asked what she expected to find out about her topic, she wrote:. We were shown a quilt that was lying over a rocking chair. His love letters had been used as foundation padding. Fragments of his writings were visible where the stitching was worn. Looking back, that quilt was a kind of metaphor for Lori, her learning style, and her participation in the group. She liked to get into the middle of something, see how it was put together, and try to tell the story of why it was like that — as she saw it.

And, like the quilt, I perceived that her life was made of many pieces, some fraying where they touched, the overall pattern hiding from immediate view a complex story exposed in fragments, but one that I suspect few will ever fully read. In Ways with Words, Heath describes the ethnographic learning process within the communities she studied as bi-directional knowledge translation and transfer between familiar and unfamiliar domains For the children Heath studied, part of their motivation would likely have come from the novel conditions her presence introduced into the class routine — a point she does not appear to discuss in detail.

Their motivation to learn would also have been reinforced by the realization that their science unit would eventually translate into the familiar marker of a grade. For the women in our study, the choice to participate in the pilot project held no such externally marked value.

They would not receive a grade, and although we did discuss certificates and a graduation, that observance could only be a group event imbued with whatever significance they personally attached to it. We would not be helping them get a job, become better mothers, or improve relationships with their caseworkers by enrolling them in a provincially recognized course of upgrading. The decision to join the program and commit to our Friday meetings — and make whatever adjustments to their lives such attendance entailed — had to have some independent intrinsic value for them.

In their ethnographic study of literacy in Lancaster, Barton and Hamilton describe literacy as patterned by such factors as gender, history, social institutions, and the various larger cultural practices in which they are situated. Furthermore, literacy reflects a dynamic set of practices that is subject to change in value and currency as individuals are continually influenced by shifting contexts of interaction, and ongoing informal learning Barton and Hamilton Clearly, the parameters or emphases of formal education do not limit the scope of literacy.

For example, Barton and Hamilton discuss learners who taught themselves about such things as betting practices, and then shared their knowledge as mentors with other interested family members, through self-directed research Furthermore, it is important to examine what people value in their lives. Maureen, who graduated more than a year ago, put her situation in these terms: However, there are few jobs where she lives, and relocating with a young family is difficult.

Additionally, she would need to make at least ten dollars an hour in order to pay a sitter in the rural community where she now resides. If she moves to the city, her living expenses will be higher, so she will have to earn even more. A report by the National Anti-Poverty Organization establishes its opening arguments with the following assertion:. Moreover, because of systemic inequality, the acquisition of literacy skills alone does not automatically lead to a better standard of living.

Teaching people to read and write will not create jobs that do not exist, make it easier to survive on the minimum wage or get rid of discrimination against disadvantaged groups in our society. She cites the mutual interactions of a number of intrinsic and extrinsic factors that impact negatively on the learning context. Understandably, irregular attendance poses a significant challenge to program design and, in many instances, continued and stable funding. Perhaps the pilot project was the only aspect of her life to which she could say: Class issues require some further explication at this point.

Certainly, they explored the house enthusiastically, and were all struck by the different formal and informal conversations and stories that were expressed in the domestic environment as a whole, and that spilled out into the placement and styles of trim on the outside. Likewise, they noticed that the exuberant flourishes of gingerbread that announced themselves so forcefully to visitors at the front of the house softened to a whisper at the sides, and fell silent around the back.

They decided that the lack of trim around the back of the house suggested that a much smaller and more familiar audience would use the rear of the house, and therefore an elaborate external presentation was not necessary. Perhaps because this project was an extra to the extent that it was not linked to any other officially sponsored course or program, the women felt free to move beyond the House as the frame and historical family setting that constituted both their focus and their classroom. They seemed drawn to pose and explore questions that were not addressed immediately by what they saw.

The fact that they were women researchers regularly accessing the domestic spaces of other women who could not tell their own stories may also have influenced them — consciously or unconsciously — to set parameters around the kinds of questions they felt were appropriate to ask. However, I would like to take a moment to reflect on changes I have implemented in the project sites that form the focus of my postdoctoral research.

Of the participants in the pilot, I would say that Maureen and Jennifer gained the most from the experience because they worked together, and their friendship was a source of mutual support, something that Sarah lacked. Working together on a collaborative project, they also had to keep each other focused, which was a problem for Lori. The pilot project, though modest, yielded many valuable insights and suggested possibilities for future application. After commencing my postdoctoral research in October , I coordinated two field sites from January-March , one in Sydney, Cape Breton and the other in Bridgewater on the South Shore.

I developed a series of initial participant information sessions with activities that are linked to learning outcomes in the recently revised provincial curriculum, such as the demonstration of active listening skills, the ability to ask questions and present information to a group, and interviewing. The two site projects took place over six to eight weeks, for one half day per class group per week. In the first session, students were introduced to the study of objects through the analysis of a common cultural object, such as disposable coffee cup.

In the second session, students learned about the analysis of photographs.

Nova Scotia Memories - Folklore of the St. Mary's (Paperback)

In this session, they were provided with single-use cameras and instructed to take photographs of favorite places, people, and objects. Also, they were shown archival photographs within the museum collection and given a series of questions to ask about the photographs. They were also encouraged to generate new questions about the photographs they were given, or about others from the collection. In the week following, students were introduced to interviewing. At this session, participants returned the cameras for processing. The next two to three weeks gave students supported but self-directed research time to study their topics.

At this time, students received their developed pictures. They looked at them for a few minutes, and then traded them with another group of students who arranged the pictures in the form of a collection. They were invited to ask questions of the students who took the pictures and rearrange the collection as necessary and discuss the pictures. At this time, participants learned about concepts such as provenance in order to give them some idea of the issues that go into developing an exhibit from a museum collection when the curator only has limited access to information.

The two sites reflect contrasting conditions in terms of setting, student composition and skill level, and outcomes. There was only one male student in this project, and he was an enthusiastic participant throughout.

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Except for the first day, no teacher or tutor was present because some students opted not to participate, and therefore the instructor had to stay in the classroom with the remaining students. Although the DesBrisay Museum is severely short-staffed, the Director was extremely supportive, and devoted a considerable amount of his limited time to helping the students. All of the students in the Bridgewater group demonstrated a generally positive attitude toward writing, regardless of level. Eighteen students originally signed the plain language release forms in the Bridgewater project; however, nearly half failed to attend.

Others left the project after one or two sessions, and one completed a significant amount of work in the museum project, even though she eventually left her upgrading classes. She received a certificate of completion for the museum project at its conclusion. In total, seven students completed the DesBrisay project. In Sydney, I worked with ten learners, one teacher, one tutor and the volunteer president of the local Whitney Pier Historical Society, who was also our museum contact.

The Whitney Pier Museum is seasonal, and was closed during the research period. We met in one of the classrooms at the Learning Network. In the Sydney group, all of the learners associated with the network were from a Level 1 and 2 class, and six were male. Two of the four female students were not currently enrolled in an upgrading program, although one had strong writing skills and often worked independently in the class.

Most of the students in Sydney, however, were extremely reticent about writing. Accordingly, after the project received some funds from a Human Resources Development program, the Learning Centre purchased some small tape recorders. Students recorded their responses, and I transcribed them for the following week. In this way, the students could create texts even if they felt that their writing skills were restrictive. Although the Windsor pilot only involved observation and note-taking on my part, at both later sites I documented sessions through the use of audio and video recordings, in addition to my own notes.

Also, I made copies of any student writing, taped responses, interviews and photographs they took. All ten students completed the Sydney project. The information sessions were a feature of both site projects. As might be expected, given the very different features of the two sites, the ways the students responded to and used the information were completely different across the two groups, particularly with regard to interviewing. In Sydney, several students opted to interview members of the local community following that orientation session.

Overall, I think that most instructors of introductory folklore classes would concur that these were pretty good interviews. They developed questions, and the resulting transcripts show an awareness of how to use the technology, how to ask thoughtful questions that solicit elaborated answers and how to listen actively. In Bridgewater, none of the students conducted interviews, although they wrote willingly and quite well. In light of the research by Labrie and others into the differences between alphabetical and oral worldviews, this result with literacy learners is striking, and merits further attention.

I examine this relationship with particular emphasis on women learners in the Sydney project in another article Kozar Teachers provide ongoing support and encouragement for students who have entered a new learning environment that requires risk-taking and problem solving. In the pilot project, although the Shand House interpreters were helpful and willing to share knowledge, they were not actively involved with the learners.

There are a variety of possible reasons for this, all of which are beyond the scope of this discussion.

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As a result, part of the process of knowledge exchange could not occur. According to Matusov and Rogoff, learning. Establishing contexts in which learners and museum staff and volunteers gain insight into different communities of practice suggested rich and worthwhile ethnographic learning opportunities that ultimately formed the basis of my postdoctoral work. Although we had a graduation in the pilot project and the women who completed their research received certificates, we were unable to come up with a product that incorporated their work.

An exhibit or publication serves such a purpose because it frames the learning process in a public way. Finally, I think it is important to remember that in a global economy, we must not loose sight of the local. In a wired world, we must not ignore the points of disconnection, and the disconnected. They are the frequent and the many, not the few and far between. Folklore, as part of adult learning — indeed, as a fundamental part of any formal and informal cultural education — illuminates the importance of the smaller patterns of daily existence within the larger ones.

Also, when a learner understands that her knowledge about her world is a kind of expertise, she develops greater self-confidence, something that conventional education and training programs frequently fail to inspire. As Doucette observes, we need to. By creating communities of practice with local groups, folklorists can play a central role in strengthening the knowledge economies that matter most to the quality of community life in many parts of Canada.

Seana Kozar received her Ph. Stories from the Well Within. Seana Kozar a obtenu son Ph. A View from Nova Scotia. Abstracts Abstract This article describes a pilot project in museum based literacy learning that took place in Windsor, Nova Scotia in the autumn of Article body As a folklorist, I understand that part of the work of folklore research involves identifying and describing meaningful patterns of experience in everyday life. Much of her report focuses on their visit to the Sutherland Steam Mill and a discussion of the tools that were used at the time to create gingerbread, what it was made of, as well as the degrees of creative freedom that governed its design and production: She also notes that men took care to present a sporting appearance — and made sure that they did not perform sudden and uncontrolled dismounts in public view: As Jennifer wrote in her report: When asked what she expected to find out about her topic, she wrote: To get the free app, enter your mobile phone number.

Would you like to tell us about a lower price? Discovered 35 years after the author's death in , these fictional tales of Nova Scotia life in the early s are truly an insight into a world of beauty, hardship, determination, humor and compassion. So beautifully written, the chapters in "Nova Scotia Memories" introduce characters such as Gammy, the ancient matriarch who struggles to keep her shattered family together; Jim P, the quack doctor who preaches the efficacy of pioneer and Indian remedies until he faces the Spanish Influenza epidemic; Old Screech, the mail driver who is a devout believer in ghosts; Gussie, the crippled girl ignored by boys, who dreams of marrying and becoming a mother; Danny Fiddler, the hunchback born with music in his fingers; Peter Keeper, the backwoods sheep tender who runs away to escape military conscription into World War I; and several more.

The plots are fictional but the characters, though renamed and sometimes of composite personalities, are real. Though he spent his adult life in the United States, Nova Scotia was always "home. Today they offer a precious bit of Nova Scotia history and life along the St.

Mary's River between Sherbrooke and Antigonish years ago. Read more Read less. Kindle Cloud Reader Read instantly in your browser. Nichols, my father -- E. He is buried in Aspen, Nova Scotia in the family cemetery. Mary's" beautifully describe what life was like in the early s backwoods country of Eastern Canada. Product details File Size: Nichols Publications February 5, Publication Date: February 5, Sold by: Share your thoughts with other customers. Write a customer review. See all customer images. Showing of 3 reviews. Top Reviews Most recent Top Reviews.

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later. Kindle Edition Verified Purchase. It is a good read. I love to read old time stories and they way people lived. This is a mesmerizing read about life in Nova Scotia along the St. Mary's River area in the early s. The characters, although their names have been altered, were real people and their lives are captured on these pages, if only now in memory. What strength they showed in the harsh world of that time, and they are now wonderful examples of what life is all about without modern conveniences. These tales are beautifully written.

The stories in this book provide fantastic insight into the difficulties and rewards of life on the rural farms of Nova Scotia a century ago.

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