HIST*3480, Workplace Learning: Miscreants & Rascals
Department of History, Winter 2022
Instructor & Workplace Supervisor: Dr Kris Inwood
Interested students should contact Dr. Inwood at kinwood@uoguelph.ca [2]
Course Synopsis:
This independent study course provides direct experience in the creation and analysis of data describing Canadians imprisoned during the 19th and early 20th centuries. The lives of these people are documented in the admission registers for a select prison. This year we are working on the records of the Fort Saskatchewan Provincial Gaol in Edmonton during the 1930s and 1940s.
Your experiential learning opportunity will involve transcribing the prison registers from images of the pages in order to make rare but highly useful documents more accessible for researchers now and in the future. The transcription element of the course will cover roughly 400 admissions to prison. In connecting this work experience to your academic discipline you will write two short critical reflections and a research paper analyzing what can be learned about the patterns of offences and offenders using the prison register as a primary source.
Course Format:
You will be conducting independent work and attending class meetings. The course and your workplace are all online. Four scheduled class meetings (their day and time to be determined during the first week of class) will take place remotely in a synchronous environment.
Learning Outcomes:
- Critical Understanding of 19th & 20th-century criminal justice systems and prisons.
- Ability to understand 19th & 20th-century handwriting & vocabulary.
- Knowledge of transcription practices.
- Knowledge of research practices.
- Ability to critically reflect upon your own work.
- Ability to critically assess the strengths and weaknesses of criminal justice records as sources
Methods of Evaluation:
- Transcriptions, first draft 20%
- Transcriptions, second draft 20%
- Weekly Critical Reflections 20%
- Final Essay 40%
Texts and/or Resources Required:
No Required Textbook
**Please note: This is a preliminary web course description only. The department reserves the right to change without notice any information in this description. The final, binding course outline will be distributed in the first class of the semester.**
