CoP Task 3: Literature Search

Literature Search
(Before we moved into Level 6, my google email account was totally wiped. My whole inbox and sent box... Don't know why. I lost my OpenAthens info so, for now, I'm making a note of certain journals on JSTOR for example that I can check back at later.)

• Russell, J.B (1972).Witchcraft in the Middle Ages. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press
• Russell, J.B (1980). A History of Witchcraft. London: Thames and Hudson
• Horowitz, M.C (2005). New Dictionary of the History of Ideas. NY: Charles Scribner's Sons
• Stephens, W (2002). Demon Lovers. Chicago: University of Chicago Press
• Summers, M (1996) The History of Witchcraft and Demonology. NY: Routledge
• Ben-Yehuda, N (1980). The European Witch Craze of the 14th to 17th Centuries: A Sociologist's Perspective. American Journal of Sociology, 86(1), pp. 1-31.
• Gluckman, M. (1968). Psychological, Sociological and Anthropological Explanations of Witchcraft and Gossip: A Clarification. Man, 3(1), p.20.
• Kennedy, J. (1967). Psychological and Social Explanations of Witchcraft. Man, 2(2), p.216

CoP Task 2

TASK 2:

13th October: Tutorial 1
Idea of a question
Initial research
Quotes & images

28th October: Tutorial 2
- Clearer question
- Bullet point sections of essay

10th November: Tutorial 3
- One main section of essay written
- Practical sketches and idea for outcome

Thursday 24th Nov: Peer Review
- A3 presentation boards
- Developing sketches / thumbnails / tests
- Clear final outcomes

Tuesday 22nd Nov  >  Sunday 27th Nov: Interim Submission

- As substantial an essay draft as possible

w/c: 12th Dec - w/c: 2nd Jan: Xmas holidays
- Get essay feedback and alter accordingly
- Work on final outcomes for practical
- Evaluate
- Catch up with blog and make sure everything is documented

Friday 6th Jan: Final Crit

- Final resolutions to the Practical Element of the module

- Selected practical and conceptual development work

- A 250 word Summative Statement

- Evidence of research development and ongoing evaluation / reflection posted to CoP Blog

2nd Jan - 12th Jan: Binding / Printing
- Printing
- Binding
- Checking submission
- Presentation

CoP Task 1: Initial Ideas regarding Research Question

I've been trying to narrow down on what it is that I'm wanting to find out. My project started off looking into primitive concepts of diseases with the research that I was doing over summer, but I've found that it has become a bit more general as it opened up to looking at the witch craze. 

When I'm considering the subject, my main thought is along the lines of how did so many people end up believing in witches, magic, witchcraft, and persecuting hundreds of thousands of supposed witches throughout Europe? At a time when theories of explaining illness and disease had been being questioned for centuries. Why the sudden murder of so many innocent people persecuted as witches?

I want to find out more about using superstition as explanations for things not understood. 

When reading about primitive concepts of disease over summer, I learnt a bit about Hippocrates and his theories on diseases. 

He is credited with being one of the first people to believe that diseases weren't caused because of superstition or gods, but naturally. He separated medicine and religion, and suggested that diseases were products of environmental factors, diet and living habits. He ignored suggestions of superstition, although a lot of his beliefs were based on incorrect knowledge of anatomy and physiology, and Humorism was key. (Humorism: excess or deficiency of any of four distinct bodily fluids in a person—known as humors or humours—directly influences their temperament and health. Wiki)

Still though, I find it interesting to learn all of this, which was said back in around the 4th century BC. Then to move forward to the 16th, 17th, 18th centuries and see that people are burnt at the stake for witchcraft.. I want to learn why superstition was still so high, why the masses were led to believe in it. Was it just an easy scapegoat to explain things that weren't yet understood?

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People believed in witchcraft in the 17th century because they needed a way to explain the unexplainable, according to the BBC. When situations came up that could not be explained due to the lack of scientific and medical knowledge, people needed a scapegoat to help the masses understand. The easiest way to do that was to blame demonic powers.

Although witch hunts were popular in England during the 16th and 17th centuries, witchcraft persecutions started much earlier in other places in Europe. Historians have found evidence of witchcraft persecutions in places such as Switzerland and France as far back as the 14th century.

In the 17th century, people believed that witchcraft was practised by women who had rejected God and made a pact with evil spirits. From 1484, when Pope Innocent VIII declared witchcraft a heresy, until 1750, historians believe that nearly 200,000 people across Europe were burned as witches.

The fear of witches in Europe was only amplified by the fact that many famous kings were frightened of witchcraft. King James I was historically famous for being terrified of witches and witchcraft. In 1567, he advocated the writing of a book called “Daemonologia.” This book set the stage for how witches were identified throughout the 16th and 17th centuries.

(https://www.reference.com/world-view/did-people-believe-witchcraft-17th-century-f97cab94fe4f5f75#)

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I think I might need to look into belief systems or breakdowns of belief systems? Religion as a coping mechanism?

At a time when the Plague swept through Europe, people needed something to believe in and something to help them understand. Also possibly something or someone to blame.

CoP Lecture 1

Lecture Notes:

Organising research project

Project management and timetabling
Blog proposal
6000 to 9000 words

DEADLINE: 12 Jan '17
- 15 weeks
- Start asap

PLAN & initial ideas for practical

*** Try to have the first draft done for interim submission ***

- Project needs to evidence a strategic approach / methodology
- Practical and written need to be cohesive
- In depth research in sketchbook and essay that work together
- Write a list of potential questions

TASK 1:
- Why am I looking at my question?
What do I want to find out?
What do I want to achieve?
Is the question researchable within 15 weeks?
Can I write about it in 9000 words?

Should lead to a working title.

- Title needs to be an answerable thesis, not a statement
- Must be a question that can be answered in a conclusion
- No more than 15 to 20 words in title

- Make notes of potential questions that I find throughout my research
- Use key terminology in the title

TASK 2:
- Project outline. Plan ahead
- Use questions and link everything to the question
- Project needs to stay focused
- Timings
- Plan around holidays

- Be concise in research
- Prioritise
- Time plans for research / practical / writing
- Mini goals / targets
- Number of words by a certain deadline?
- Allow time for research and reading

Consider binding / print at the end
Factor in tutorials
Use eStudio

TASK 3:
- Literature search
- Need to know key info, key writers & sources of my topic
- Focus on 2/3/4 books for main research
- Rest of research supplements or challenges this
- T R I A N G U L A T E
- Use jstor.org

TASK 4:
- Start a bibliography
- Make notes of references now and as I find the work
- Make note of page numbers
- Bibliography should be long.. Harvard references

Dissertation should be structured into chapters
Each chapter:
Different theoretical / methodological approach?
Different thinking / writing?
Different Theories?

Intro & Conclusion
Evolving & structured arguments
Dissertation starts generally but gets more specific & concise
1) Topic as a whole
2) In a certain context?
3) A specific example?
4) Drawing it together

eStudio: guidance and order / number of words

Intro
- Clearly outline topic and explain why it is important to study
- Clearly state the research question and any sub questions
- How it is being investigated. Methods.

Main Body 1
- Argument. Structured into chapters
- Show understanding
- Research
- Key dates / events / writers / artists etc
- Triangulation

Main Body 2
- Look at illustration
- Use theory from literature or theory search and apply to artists work

- Reflective practice
- Descriptive analysis of my practical work
- Demonstrate SYNTHESIS
- Link my practical work into the dissertation
- Research / timescales etc
- Writing about own practice
- Theoretical and contextual analysis of the work that I produced

Conclusion
- 10% of dissertation
- Answers the question
- Points that I proved / raised linked to evidence in the text
- Evaluation

Start thinking about mapping out these sections
Need a Q first though

Sketchbook update & Thoughts on Practical

So far I've made a load of notes from things I've been reading and references I've found. But I've only just started exploring things more visually, sketching things that I find relevant to my research. I haven't done much at this point but I think it's important that I make sure I'm combining the visual and textual research...

I want to look into Medieval methods of image making, like relief printing and intaglio printing. I intend on exploring the aesthetics of the illustrations of the time and trying to replicate them myself through exploration of and experimentation with different mediums. I've only ever done lino cut so I'd be really interested to experiment with carving into wood, and engraving metal plates etc to see how it effects the outcomes, and how it pushes my practice forward.
My thinking is that if I have a better understanding of different print methods, I can capitalise on their strengths more.

I'm pretty sure that I'd be able to work this one out, but I might need to research the best kinds of wood to work with / how to cut with or against the grain etc.

(http://www.bpi1700.org.uk/resources/techniques_mezzotint.html)

Hopefully I will be able to book into the print room and get a tutorial on how to use some of the methods above. I want to see how it will effect the way that I think about drawing 

The Devil and His Servants: Demonic Illustrations From 18th Century Occult Book

I've been searching for loads of reference images and inspiration, collecting things that I think are relevant to my research. The Wellcome Library website includes the 'Compendium rarissimum totius Artis Magicae sistematisatae per celeberrimos Artis hujus Magistros' in it's archives, dating from around 1775. Written in German and Latin, it includes 31 water colour illustrations of demons, and three pages of magical and cabalistic signs and sigils etc.

I read that the illustrations are a mix of Greco-Roman mythical monsters (chimeras such as Cerberus and Hydra). Phoenician gods (Astarte / Astaroth), Biblical devils (Beelzebub, Satan) amongst other creations.

DangerousMinds.net :

"With the warning "NOLI ME TANGERE" ("Do Not Touch") on its cover, the compendium can be seen as a last attempt by those of faith to instil fear among the superstitious. After all, the Compendium Artis Magicae was produced during the decade of revolutions (American and French) and in the Age of Enlightenment - when reason, science and the power of the individual dominated, and the first stirrings of industry were about to change Europe and the world. The horrendous witch trials of the 16th and 17th centuries were long banished and the last execution in England for witchcraft took place in 1716 (1727 in Scotland, 1750 in Austria, 1782 in Switzerland), while the practice of witchcraft ceased to be a criminal offence across Europe during the century (England 1735) - all of which makes this Compendium Artis Magicae all the more bizarre.

Dissertation Research

I've started researching the topic of demons and diseases.. The first thing I looked up was demonology which led me to an article called 'Demonology: A Study of What is Not' by S Stepanic. It outlines the meaning of demonology, and discusses the Witch Craze briefly. It would be hard to discuss perceptions of demons causing disease and illness without talking about the period of widespread belief in witches, which resulted in thousands of unnecessary deaths through trials and witch hunts. It's astonishing to think that people were genuinely led to believe that certain individuals made pacts with the Devil and cast hexes / caused death, disease and illness etc.

I've also found references to:
'Dictionnaire Infernal' - Jacques Auguste Simon Collin de Plancy. Book on demonology describing demons organised in hierarchies. Contains illustrations of the demons:

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I came across a really interesting and helpful book called 'A History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom' by A D White. It goes into a lot of depth through different chapters outlining perceptions of illness and disease in relation to different cultures and religions through history, in contrast to the exploration of scientific methods of approaching illness, and the introduction of medicines as treatment.

I've made loads of notes, and my research then led me to come across another book: 'Syphilis, Puritanism and Witch Hunts' by S Andreski. Sounds fun.
Again, I've made a load of notes. It looks at the widespread, horrific venereal disease and explains how it was seen to be God's wrath / God's punishment for the sins of men.
The lack of scientific / medical understanding led to accusations of witches at work in regards to the dementia / paralysis / neurological effects of the disease. Hallucinations / paranoid states / depression / anxiety and confusion .....

'The spectacular eruption of the derangements described above fostered the notion that witches were proliferating and intensifying their nefarious activities.'

The book states that according to Henderson & Gillespie, '...the ratio of male to female sufferers from these psychoses is 4 to 1...which would fuel the tendency to demonise women'. 

Andreski goes on to explain '...persecutory hallucinations, caused by syphilitic psychoses, may have prompted much of the preaching and theorising about witches and Satan.'

This fits in with the Christian theologic idea that although often diseases are punishments by the Almighty, the main agency in them is Satanic.


'Satan Unbound: The Devil in Old English Narrative Literature' by P. Dendle discusses the character of the Devil throughout the Middle Ages, explaining the way in which it became elaborated through '...treatises, dramatic portrayals and folkloric assimilation of native tales within the Christian framework...'
Then later, the Devil of Medieval drama and Renaissance witch trials was depicted with 'horns and spines, multiple faces', and 'bestial proportions and features'.
The Devil acquired a new function largely unknown to the Early Middle Ages, as the God of witches and master of ceremonies at their Sabbat.

'Only the violent and hysterical excesses of the witch hunts would arouse serious questions concerning the Devil's existence.'

At this point, my research is opening up a load of different pathways which are easy to become distracted by, but also important to explore in order to figure out what direction I want my dissertation to move in.

I've tried to make sure that I'm writing things down as I'm finding them out so that I don't just bookmark pages and never return to them ever again. That happened a lot with CoP last year. Writing is a big part of my learning process, because it forces me to make sure I understand something in order to put it into my own words. When I'm reading sometimes I skim over things that don't make sense to me and it doesn't actually sink in:

Thoughts:

I'm getting a bit lost with all the research at the moment. It's easy to fall into a bit of a black hole with it all, so I'm going to start some drawing and take a break from all the reading. Taking a step back might help me to clarify where it is that I want to be.

At the moment I like the idea of looking at:
Early perceptions of illness and disease and methods of treatment, then leading to the exploration of scientific methods of explorations / development of medicines etc.

I've enjoyed reading about syphilis! Mmm. But the thing that I've been finding most interesting through this research is finding images depicting different demons / the Devil etc.

I've been collecting illustrations that I've come across, making a board on Pinterest.

https://uk.pinterest.com/georgiegozem/ouil601/

I reckon I should make a start on creating my own illustrations and getting some ideas down in my sketchbook. Thinking through drawing and trying to maintain synthesis between the written and practical elements.