Academic Curiosity

This week, David Gold discusses what to aim at when doing research especially in academics, and how to do it and where to search. And so out of his curiosity, he decided to go beyond the archives. Going beyond the archives according to him is to attend conferences, seminars, and symposium, make relevant phone calls, connect with people and individuals etc. He asserts that anything is possible with research if one is willing to devote time and money to it. He gave example of his trip to California to research on the life of Ellen Browning Scripps but ended up doing the Biography of Ritter the activist and feminist at that time period. Gold wanted researching into rhetoric but found out that going into oral history would give him more direction and focus. Humanly speaking, Gold said he was never one of those extra ordinary precocious children. Never! But knowing his limitations, he took advantage of that and maximized his potentials that he never knew were there. However, in the cause of his research, he made different connections with people and made use of everything around him like picture frames etc, and categorized all his experiences as negative and positive accidents. I think he referred to his adventures as “accident” because he stumbled and delved into things surreptitiously beyond his imagination and he states thus:
Each time I go to an archive or historical society, I ask the archivists
I meet to share my interest (and e-mail address) with other scholars
who might visit the archive. I find that networking and exchange
information about a common topic invigorates my work and leads
to further insights (25).

I personally find Gold’s statement very interesting because it gives me a clue of how and what to expect when researching in the archives. Not only that, he gave a vivid example of the essence of research and the obligations and responsibilities of researchers. He says that research brings history back to life. It serves as a powerful reminder (quoting Jacqueline Jones Royster ) he posits that:
As scholars, we have an ethical responsibility to members of the community we
study and, in the case of historical subjects, to their descendants, who have a
right to the respectful and dignified treatment if their ancestors (25).