Documentation....

[mmcnealy]

Do I really need it? If it isn't there for people to read at the People's choice A&S competition, where a pair of bugle beaded celtic knot slippers will probably win anyway, will folks even notice? Hmmmm.... huge sigh. Probably. I would.

OK, back to writting and finishing up the week's tasks at work.

Comments

[damned-colonial.livejournal.com]

From the SCA Authenticity FAQ (http://elizabethangeek.com/katrowberd/articles/sca-authenticity-faq.mhtml):

6. Do you have to document everything to be authentic?

That depends what you mean. No, you don't need to carry around a sheaf of paperwork for everything you do -- after all, medieval people didn't carry around a sheaf of paperwork to prove that their hose were the right kind, or to hand out to everyone they told a story to. The only time you need to present documentation per se is if you want to explain your hose or your story to other people and want to provide some printed material, references, etc to back up what you tell them. That usually means if you're entering it in a competition or running a class.

On the other hand, you may wish to write documentation as part of your own private research process. As you read books, visit museums, or practice techniques for some project you're working on, it can often be useful to note down what you've learnt as you do it. That means that if, at a later date, you do want to run a class or enter a competition, you will have your references prepared already and won't have to go back and try to reconstruct them from your imperfect memory.

7. OK then, do you have to research everything to be authentic?

Ah, now that's a different question. Research and documentation are not the same thing. Research is a process, documentation is one of the products of that process. (The other product is probably your own re-creation of whatever it is you're researching.)

Generally speaking, we can't assert that something is authentic without doing research to back up that assertion. Sometimes someone else will have done the research already, and we can base our work on theirs, but that's what's called a "secondary source" (or in some cases a tertiary source), and most people into authenticity prefer to get as close the the original source (the "primary source") as possible.

A quick tangent on the subject of sources: a tunic dug up from a bog is a primary source. A paper written about that tunic is a secondary source. A Tournaments Illuminated article which references that paper and other secondary sources is a tertiary source. There is some debate as to whether a contemporary painting of a garment is a primary or secondary source. Some would consider it to be a secondary source for costuming but a primary source for painting. Others would say that it depends on how real to life the painting is -- for instance, Hans Holbein's extremely detailed and lifelike paintings of the costume of the Tudor court might be considered a better source for costuming than the cartoon-like picture of a person in the margins of a 12th century illuminated manuscript.

Anyway, those who seek to be authentic in their re-creations aim to get as close to primary sources as is possible, within the usual constraints of cost, availability, time, and degree of personal interest. You can choose to skimp on research if you want, but be aware that the research is directly correlated to how much faith we can put in something as an authentic re-creation. If you haven't researched it enough to feel pretty sure about it, don't say it's authentic.