Part 5: Documentation as Courage

This will be the last post in our series on the Virtues of documentation.  Throughout this series of posts we’ve used the virtues associated with the peerage orders of the SCA as a lens to look at documentation.  The last virtue we’ll discuss is courage.  

As one of the main virtues we associate with the Chivalry, the idea of courage tends to conjure images of heroic deeds on the battlefield or in tournaments.  But, there are things in all parts of our lives that require courage, including the Arts and Sciences of the SCA.  It can take courage to try something new.  It can take courage to ask for help.  It can take courage to correct mistakes or start over when something goes wrong.  

So, how does our documentation show courage?  

Sharing your documentation takes courage.  Whether you are putting your work into a competition or display, putting it online in a blog or social media post, or just sharing with your friends and members in your local group, sharing your documentation can be scary.  Allowing anyone else to look through your work may come with the possibility of criticism.  In an ideal world, criticism would always be constructive and delivered only when requested and consented to.  But, even among friends it can be scary to open your work to criticism.  And it takes courage to overcome the fear of criticism.  

Sharing your documentation can also invite debate.  It’s perfectly reasonable for different people to look at the same evidence and come to different conclusions.  For example, in the SCA we are often trying to reproduce historical items based on very limited information about how they were originally made.  It’s very easy in these situations for different people to come to different conclusions based on limited information.  In these circumstances, debate is often healthy.  But defending your choices can be scary, too.  And being open to debate, being asked to defend your decisions and conclusions, also takes courage.  

I often hear that people are intimidated by documentation in the Arts and Sciences.  Either because it’s something new to them, or because they are worried they won’t do it well.  But, if you can find the courage to overcome such doubts, the world of A&S can be very rewarding.

– Abu-Darzin Ibrahim al-Rashid, Laureate

Part 4: Documentation as Perseverence 

Continuing our series looking at documentation in the Arts & Sciences through the lens of the virtues exemplified by our Society’s peerage orders, we will look now at one of the less commonly discussed virtues: perseverance.

In our Society, we’ve come to associate perseverance with the Order of Defence.  The members of that Order obviously display skill at arms and honor.  But, in recognition of the long history that led to the creation of the Order of Defence, its members are also seen as exemplifying perseverance – the persistence toward a goal despite difficulties and delays.  

All of us experience obstacles in our pursuits.  Since the focus of these posts is the Arts and Sciences within the SCA, we’ll focus on the kinds of obstacles that we can encounter in re-creating the skills, arts, combat, and culture of the pre-17th century world.  Sometimes we don’t know where to look for information on the things we’re trying to re-create.  Sometimes, we learn about a book or an item in a museum but we have no way to get to it.  Sometimes, we vaguely remember hearing about something but can’t quite remember the details.  

So, how does our documentation help with all this?    

I like to think of good notes and records as a gift to my future self.  When I am looking into something related to items that I’ve previously studied, I can go back to the notes I took and whatever formal documentation that I’ve written up to refresh my memory.  This prevents me from having to replicate work that I’ve already done.  You don’t have to start each project by re-inventing the wheel (unless your project is to re-invent a wheel!).  When I try to reproduce a historical artifact, I may try out several possible ways of doing something.  Keeping some record of which technique produced which results or which materials did or didn’t perform as I wanted is extremely helpful.  I have found the ability to keep building on what I’ve done previously has helped me keep pursuing the Arts & Sciences over many years.  

Not everyone wants to keep digging deeper and deeper into the same subjects.  But when you do, having the documentation from your previous efforts accessible is a tremendous help.  This is one way to cultivate a lifelong interest.  So, keep on doing what you’re doing.  And use the documentation from your previous work as a tool to move forward into new endeavors.  

– Abu-Darzin Ibrahim al-Rashid, Laureate

Part 3: Documentation as Service 

This post will continue our series looking at documentation in the Arts & Sciences through the lens of the virtues exemplified by our Society’s peerage orders.  Today we will talk about service.  

To a very large degree, the SCA is an organization built on service.  This tradition of volunteerism is so central to our Society that it is the chief basis of the Order of the Pelican.  Members of that Order are recognized for their exemplary service to their Kingdom and the Society.  Even if you don’t aspire to the highest level of service, most of us seek to give back to the Kingdom and Society in our own ways.  

Because our Events focus on re-creating the skills, arts, combat, and culture of the pre-17th century world, creating that atmosphere relies on our knowledge of what the pre-17th century world was like.  Often, our Events will feature a tournament in a period format, or a feast serving period food, or a hall decorated to resemble a room or building from our period, or historical entertainments such as music and plays.  If you’ve ever been at an Event with these elements, then you know how that extra touch adds to the ambience.  Research into the Arts and Sciences leads to these additional touches that allow our Events to attempt the illusion of immersing ourselves in a different time and place.  And sharing the details of where such elements came from with the populace helps people to appreciate them even more.  

Another way that sharing your documentation provides service to our Society is in helping others with their research.  Metressa Jadwiga Zajaczkowa is a member of the Order of the Laurel, who also works as a research librarian in the modern world.  She says that “Many people don’t realize that clear citation references help other people use your research as a springboard for more by being able to precisely retrieve the information you accessed. This allows them to understand the topic and context better and find new information for their own work.”  

First of all, there’s far too much information out there for any one person to research all aspects of even a very specific time and place.  But many of us in the SCA have overlapping and related interests.  Details that are tangential to your own research might be exactly what someone else is looking for.  As one example, you may have been looking at jewelry found in the excavation of a burial site.  But, perhaps that same grave also contained weapons or pottery or other types of grave goods.  Someone else with an interest in the same culture might be more interested in those things.  By sharing information about that burial site, you give them something that can help further their own research.  

Secondly, other people researching the exact same thing as you will still want to review all the details themselves.  Each of us brings our own background and perspective to research.  Different people looking at the same thing may find different details or come to different conclusions from the same evidence.  And that’s part of the process!  All of this furthers our knowledge of the pre-17th century world, which is one of our core missions as an educational organization.  

As we’ve said, the SCA relies on volunteerism.  There are many ways to serve our Society.  You don’t have to sit on a throne, or run Events to serve.  Just sharing the research that you’ve done and the knowledge you have about pre-17th century cultures is its own form of service.  

– Abu-Darzin Ibrahim al-Rashid, Laureate

Part 2: Documentation as Courtesy 

In the first post of this series, we talked a bit about what we mean when we talk about documentation in our Arts and Sciences.  The remainder of this series will talk about how documenting our re-creation efforts furthers the various virtues that we hold dear in our Society.  

Often, we think about the virtues celebrated by the SCA as being exemplified by our various Peerage orders.  If you have witnessed a Peerage ceremony, you will have likely seen members from each of the orders speaking about how the new peerage candidate exemplifies each of these virtues.  However, even if you don’t aspire to any of our Peerages, you can still embody and promote these virtues.  

The Order of the Laurel is usually seen as exemplifying skill and knowledge.  And it’s almost too obvious to mention how sharing your research demonstrates knowledge and skill.  So, I’d like to move on to the virtue of courtesy.  

Courtesy is a virtue often associated with the Order of the Rose.  It is not just behaving politely toward others, but more broadly acting with love and respect toward all.  As a Society that assumes a level of nobility for all our participants, we are all expected to treat each other with respect and courtesy.  

How does our documentation in the Arts and Sciences further the goal of courtesy in our Society?  One aspect of courtesy is simply giving credit where credit is due.  Presenting documentation of your re-creation tells people where you got the information you used.  Whether you’re digging into documents from archives, analyzing surviving objects from our period, or just relying on the research of other SCA members, letting others know where you found that information is just the courteous thing to do.  Living or dead, friend or stranger, professional or amateur, everyone is owed the courtesy of giving them credit for their contributions.  

Often, when we are making our re-creations we are not just copying what other people have found, but making our own decisions based on that evidence.  Master Justin du Coeur, a long-time member of the Order of the Laurel, has described one aspect of good documentation as showing what others have said in order to demonstrate why you’ve made the conclusions that ultimately led to the final product.  This makes a clear distinction between your own ideas and conclusions and those of other researchers whose work you are building upon.  Without explicitly citing where you got information, someone might think everything presented is your own work – even if you don’t explicitly try to take credit for it all.  Allowing others to think that some else’s idea is your own would be discourteous.  And this discourtesy is avoided by making sure to always credit the sources you’ve used in crafting your own work.  

So, in the interest of promoting a courteous Society, let’s all start sharing our documentation!  

– Abu-Darzin Ibrahim al-Rashid, Laureate