prospectus and other work
Apr. 10th, 2006 09:03 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
theyellowhobbitI finished my Hellerstein paper last night. I finished my primates paper this afternoon. Then I visted Ben and told him about my work woes. He said that the prospectus was due some time today, and that he was purposefully vague, so I could submit it online by midnight. We also talked about what my prospectus should include, which ended up being a lot of good ideas, most of which I've forgotten. So I e-mailed Ben a frantic e-mail:
Hey Ben,
As I started to write my prospectus my mind froze, and now I'm struggling to remember all the points we covered today when I came to your office hours. [Would it be a Rachel paper if I didn't have something go wrong? Have I ever handed anything in on time?] Right now it talks about the geographic locations in which they were found, the text and the problems it poses, and the context in which the miqva'ot were found. Which of course gives me around half a page. and I'm sure I know more than a half a page, but it's just not coming to me. Maybe I subconsciously think that it's summer already.
And already I started talking about the historical record, when really I know you want a simple pre-question paper that presents the archaeological record. Which easily could be more than 10 pages anyways since I'm sure there are tons of graphics and I'm looking at a lot of different excavation reports. But at the same time, it's kind of hard to stretch that out into a prospectus.
So I'm not even asking for any more ideas, just a restating of the ideas we already came up with. I shouldn't be having this much difficulty with it, but for some reason I am. Maybe it's the problem of separating the thesis from the 10-page paper, since I tend to get ahead of myself. [who wants to tediously examine archaeological reports when you can look at different cultural influences and speculate on what the reports actually mean?]
If I have until midnight that still leaves me 4.25 hours in which I can do something else until my mind starts working again [assuming it will]. I'll turn in something tonight, hopefully a reasonably good prospectus that does everything it is supposed to do.
Thanks,
~Rachel
this is what I have so far.
I am going to explore the archaeology of miqva’ot (ritual baths) in the late Hellenistic and Roman periods in Israel. Miqva’ot do not appear until about the first century BC. They have been found in Gezer, Jericho, Gamla, Jerusalem, Qumran, and Masada as well as in rural contexts. Some of these miqva’ot can be dated by the earliest and latest pottery found. Qumran is more of an enigma, being an isolated settlement, and is dated by the recorded earthquakes rather than the pottery, which remains the same throughout the site’s occupation (150 BCE – 170 CE).
The textual evidence, here meaning the Torah, mentions the idea of ritual bathing to rid oneself of impurity as a requirement of Jewish Law in the book of Leviticus. I date Leviticus at 1250 BCE, but even the documentary hypothesis can date it to as early as Hezekiah in the 5th century BCE, so working with that assumption, there is still a significant period of time where these laws were in place and there were no miqva’ot.
The context in which the miqva’ot were found may be very informative as to the nature of their usage. Miqva’ot were found in cities, in the countryside, in tombs, and in personal houses. I will look at all the different excavation reports that mention miqva’ot and compare the dimensions and other physical attributes (such as architectural style), location, date, and type of place in which it was found. This should give an idea as to what the archaeological record is that we can work with. I suspect that the chronology of the different miqva’ot will show an evolution in usage (ie personal miqva’ot vs. communal ones). I will then examine how well this matches up with the historical record that we have, which includes the works of Josephus, and accounts from the mishnah and the gemara.
Help!!
Hey Ben,
As I started to write my prospectus my mind froze, and now I'm struggling to remember all the points we covered today when I came to your office hours. [Would it be a Rachel paper if I didn't have something go wrong? Have I ever handed anything in on time?] Right now it talks about the geographic locations in which they were found, the text and the problems it poses, and the context in which the miqva'ot were found. Which of course gives me around half a page. and I'm sure I know more than a half a page, but it's just not coming to me. Maybe I subconsciously think that it's summer already.
And already I started talking about the historical record, when really I know you want a simple pre-question paper that presents the archaeological record. Which easily could be more than 10 pages anyways since I'm sure there are tons of graphics and I'm looking at a lot of different excavation reports. But at the same time, it's kind of hard to stretch that out into a prospectus.
So I'm not even asking for any more ideas, just a restating of the ideas we already came up with. I shouldn't be having this much difficulty with it, but for some reason I am. Maybe it's the problem of separating the thesis from the 10-page paper, since I tend to get ahead of myself. [who wants to tediously examine archaeological reports when you can look at different cultural influences and speculate on what the reports actually mean?]
If I have until midnight that still leaves me 4.25 hours in which I can do something else until my mind starts working again [assuming it will]. I'll turn in something tonight, hopefully a reasonably good prospectus that does everything it is supposed to do.
Thanks,
~Rachel
this is what I have so far.
I am going to explore the archaeology of miqva’ot (ritual baths) in the late Hellenistic and Roman periods in Israel. Miqva’ot do not appear until about the first century BC. They have been found in Gezer, Jericho, Gamla, Jerusalem, Qumran, and Masada as well as in rural contexts. Some of these miqva’ot can be dated by the earliest and latest pottery found. Qumran is more of an enigma, being an isolated settlement, and is dated by the recorded earthquakes rather than the pottery, which remains the same throughout the site’s occupation (150 BCE – 170 CE).
The textual evidence, here meaning the Torah, mentions the idea of ritual bathing to rid oneself of impurity as a requirement of Jewish Law in the book of Leviticus. I date Leviticus at 1250 BCE, but even the documentary hypothesis can date it to as early as Hezekiah in the 5th century BCE, so working with that assumption, there is still a significant period of time where these laws were in place and there were no miqva’ot.
The context in which the miqva’ot were found may be very informative as to the nature of their usage. Miqva’ot were found in cities, in the countryside, in tombs, and in personal houses. I will look at all the different excavation reports that mention miqva’ot and compare the dimensions and other physical attributes (such as architectural style), location, date, and type of place in which it was found. This should give an idea as to what the archaeological record is that we can work with. I suspect that the chronology of the different miqva’ot will show an evolution in usage (ie personal miqva’ot vs. communal ones). I will then examine how well this matches up with the historical record that we have, which includes the works of Josephus, and accounts from the mishnah and the gemara.
Help!!
