scott does scotland: travel adventures

It’s kind of shocking that this is our last official blog of the semester! It seems appropriate that we’re discussing archives so modern they hardly seem like archives under the classical definition. Joanne Garde-Hansen’s chapter “MyMemories?: Personal Digital Archive Fever and Facebook” addressed Facebook’s ‘archive-ness’ using Derrida as a middleman of sorts; her ideas can also be applied to other forms of social media. I’ll focus mainly on Facebook, which has become something of a staple to our generation, as well as two newer forms: Snapchat and PostSecret. Garde-Hansen says…read more

First and foremost, as a born-and-bred Canadian, I grew up learning about the exploitation, forced assimilation, and essential whitewashing of First Nations people in school, so our continued focus on photographs often featuring residential schools is relevant and interesting, but incredibly sobering. I will try my best to be sensitive to these issues and the traumatic memories that are still near to the hearts of many individuals. (Secondly, I am very sleep-deprived, so I apologize in advance if any of this does not read smoothly or if any sentences don’t…read more