M Peake Nasrallah

Meredith Hand
ENC 4942
12/07/16
Self-Evaluation
It was the last week of July when I heard that Michael Neal was conducting an internship
with the English department at Florida State University. I learned from a previous friend of mine
that he taught a visual rhetoric class and that he was a big part of founding an online postcard
database which is mostly run my students. I emailed Professor Neal during my last couple days
on vacation at Indian Rocks Beach. He immediately responded saying that he could certainly
offer me internship credit and experience archiving postcards into FSUs database. After meeting
with Professor Neal the first week of school, I confirmed that I would start interning for him by
signing the FSU issued internship contract. Two weeks later, I met with Professor Neal and three
other students and he explained to us how to input postcards into the database, the general
purpose of the database, and his goals he had for his students who were interning. I was very
excited for the experience I would be getting with postcards and archiving in an online database.
I began my archiving experience with familiarizing myself with the dublin core metadata
input system on the database which consists some of the basic info about the card itself. Once I
had successfully figured out how to put data from the card into the dublin core, I moved onto the
item type metadata section which goes into greater depth about the details of the card and what is
on it. The dublin core metadata consists of information like a title, subject, description, creator,
source, publisher, date, contributor, rights, relation, format, language, type, identifier, and
coverage. Each of these uniquely identifies the card.
The title section is simply a named title for the card whether it be created by the archiver
or taken from the card itself. The subject is a section that lists keywords from a pre-determined
list that describes what is in the picture on the front of the postcard. The description is a brief
sentence or two that tells the viewer what is depicted on the cards front. Creator is simply a note
of the original copyright holder if applicable. Also, the source is just the country of origin, the
publisher is obviously the publishing company, and the date is simply any discernible date on the
card. Then in the contributor section, the archiver makes note of any photographers or artists
given credit for creating the card image. The rights section is simply a selection of whether the
card is in the public domain or protected. The relation is the series number which is only if the
card is part of a larger series of cards that all contain a common theme. The format is the actual
dimensions of the card, the language is, of course, the language of text printed on the card, and
the type is whether the card is a postcard, stereocard, first day issue, or postcard folder. The
identifier is a unique catalog number the identifies the card individually in the greater database
and is used to refer to the card in the physical archive. Finally, the coverage is simply the
location of the distributor.
The item type metadata is a lot more in depth as it examines specific details on the card.
It starts out with a title section which is basically the same the title section in the dublin core. It
then asks what type of material the card is made of and allows a selection of either paper, metal,
wood, or leather. Next is the orientation of the card: whether its portrait or landscape. The
classification section which specifies whether the card is personal or commercial which is
determined by whether an advertisers name is present on the card. The genre is a section that

allows you to select whether the card is a greeting, art, portrait, scene, travel, or pre-formatted
card which was scene most of the time in my experience. Then the archiver has to input the user
added text on the card and this is usually the most lengthy process when adding a card to the
database. The special section is rarely used, but is for unique cards that are hold to light, bas
relief, or private mailing. The coloring section simply asks if the picture on the front of the
card is either colored, color-added, color-unsure, sepia, or black and white. The type of image
section asks whether the the picture is an illustration, a photograph, unknown, or other. The
printed text is what is printed on the front and back of the card and there are sections for both as
well as for the user added text. The back format section is a selection of whether the back of the
card has a dividing line or not. Next, it asks whether or not the card has a stamp, the price of the
stamp, and whether or not the card is postmarked. It then asks for the archiver to input the
postmark date, the address on the card and whether or not the card is addressed.
Once all the information in the dublin core and item type metadata have been completed,
the archiver has to upload four different scans of the card: two scans of the front and two scans of
the back, a jpeg and tif version of each. The archiver then has to add tags that generally describes
the features of the card and input a location into the map function which usually relates to the
postmark. The page can the be set as private or public so depending on its status of completion.
Once the page is public, it is searchable in the database via a plethora of advanced search
options. As part of my internship, I had to upload scans of my postcards to the server in the
Williams building via flash drive or direct scan. These scans are categorized by identifier
number.
As part of the internship, I also had to edit other cards in the database that were either
incomplete or needed some touch up on grammar or input mistakes. Some cards were missing so
much information that they had to be deleted and other cards I had to redo some of the scans that
were missing or not uploaded properly. The editing process did not take nearly as long as adding
cards to the database. Some cards took as much as thirty minutes each. While completing the
required amount of words for editing and adding cards, I compiled information from each card I
worked on into a word document. This document had the identifier numbers of each card, the url
to its site on the database, and the word count inputted by me. The last part of my internship
involved me creating an exhibit of several postcards that have a similar theme. In my exhibit, I
chose birds as my theme and I hand picked five cards from the database that all depicted
different species of birds. I examined each card and wrote several hundred words about each
describing the card and the background information about the bird type and the reason for its
presence on the front of the card. The exhibit has tags which are terms that generally identify
what my exhibit is about. It also has a title and options for pages and subpages which are links to
each postcard page with my analysis on each.
To complete my internship, I had to compile everything that I did and display it on my
eportfolio which is a website I created in my WEPO class. I made a separate page for my
archiving internship which had links to pages that had information of the cards that I added,
edited, and my exhibit. My eportfolio is specifically designed to feel like a virtual billboard of
my life and is in many ways a quick study of the type of person that I am. I enjoyed updating my
eportfolio the most out of any project I completed during this internship. This helped me gain
more experience with web design as well as organizing large amounts of information into easily
deciphered format.
Overall, this internship taught me a great deal as it regards archiving and database usage.
Previously, I had very little experience with archiving in general, but after adding and editing

cards I feel that I can take on almost any archiving task. I believe that this internship has
prepared me for my career outside of college and the skills that I have acquired will be beneficial
for me as an Editing, Writing, and Media major and in my career in the media industry.
Personally, I think that this internship could have been much better if it involved a more hands on
aspect like creating a postcard of my own or modifying the database in someway.
After spending a few months inputting cards into the metadata forms and editing cards, I
have learned to pay attention to detail especially when it comes to hand written script. I was
forced to decipher script that was many times unreadable or in a foreign language. This taught
me some tricks on how to read hand written cursive script, especially script that is abnormally
small and distorted. Most importantly though, this internship gave me a valid understanding of
how important archiving in an online database is. Archiving physical documents into an online
database like FSUCardArchive is essential in preserving memorabilia like postcards since our
world has transitioned almost completely to a digital sphere. Now, some of these ancient
postcards are available just a few clicks away for research, interest, and inspiration.
There were a few things I would have done differently during my internship. Firstly, I
would have started with less postcards to add into the database because I was overwhelmed by
the amount of work and some of the quality was lost. Secondly, I would have started my exhibit
back in October with postcards that I discovered in the physical database rather than waiting till
the end of November and using cards that were already in the database. The benefits of using
cards that are in the physical database and adding them yourself for your exhibit is that your
exhibit is the only one who is using those particular cards. This makes your exhibit unique
amongst others. Thirdly, I should have began compiling the information about my added and
edited cards when I first started rather than scrambling at the end to discover the cards I had
worked on on the database and then using them in the word document.
Conclusively, archiving postcards is a great way to earn experience with database usage
and the organization of information, but it also a great way to gain useful knowledge about
history. Every time I read a card and examined the user added text on the back of the card, it
brought be back to a different time period where life was simpler, whether it be the 50s or the
20s. People communicated with each other differently back then. They were completely ok with
not talking to each other for many weeks at a time with the supplement of just a few sentences on
a card. Life without social media, easy access to phones, and texting made individuals rely on
postcards to send small bytes of information. I found that this semester I have been able to
appreciate historical communication and the world that used to be since I was forced to look at
private communication between various different people on postcards sent throughout the world.
Michael Neal is an excellent professor and he taught me and my peers in this archiving
program a lot about appreciating the value of historical communication through our experience
with postcard archiving. I can tell that he really enjoys maintaining the database and teaching
students to respect and understand its use. Professor Neal was very open with allowing us to
pursue a variety of different themes when creating our exhibits which I really liked. It made the
project a lot more fun and I was able to get much more out of it than I would have if there were
strict guidelines for what was expected.
Word Count TotalsEditing 511
Writing 2739
Exhibit 835
Total Word Count 4,085