Research Proposal Completed
I’ve finally finished my research paper proposal for one of my history classes. The research paper is going to be about Reinhard Gehlen, but I have discussed that in a previous post. I feel a lot better about the paper now though because I now have a clear direction in which I want to head with the paper. I now know exactly what I am going to argue and how I’m going to go about doing it with the sources I’ve found.
There are a couple of books that I would really like to use, however, one of them is currently checked out and isn’t due back until May and the other book isn’t available at the library at my university. I put in a request to get it from Colorado State University’s library through our Interlibrary Loan Service, but who knows how long that will take. I probably won’t get it until the end of this month or even later. Unfortunately it’s a primary source, which is important. The book is the memoirs of James Critchfield who worked with Reinhard Gehlen directly. Critchfield worked on the CIA side of things, so it would be interesting to get that perspective. As of now, I just have Gehlen’s perspective which, without the other perspective, is quite biased. Hopefully I will get it soon enough to be able to use it as a resource for my paper.
LibraryThing
So I broke down and decided to catalog my ever-growing personal library. I chose to use an online tool called LibraryThing because it seemed like a good way of keeping track of everything. There are other tools out there that I considered, many of which are offline, however most of the cost money and I didn't want to spend money on something when I can get it for free. LibraryThing seems like a good tool. I haven't cataloged my entire library yet, only what I happen to have on hand with me at the moment. All 38 books. I have a much larger collection of books that I still need to move to my apartment at some point.
If you are interested, you can view my library here. I will also be putting a link to my library catalog as a button on the right side of the blog so readers can view it at anytime.
If you have any books that you think I should add to my library or any comments, feel free to leave me a comment on this post or any other post.
Here is a widget with some of my books:
Oldest English Words
The BBC is running an interesting article about the oldest words in the English language. Researchers are currently saying that they believe the oldest words still in use in modern English are "I", "we", "two" and "three" which date back tens of thousands of years. They also cite words such as "squeeze", "guts", "stick" and "bad" as words that will go extinct. Here is a portion of the article:
Some of the oldest words in English have been identified, scientists say.
Reading University researchers claim "I", "we", "two" and "three" are among the most ancient, dating back tens of thousands of years.
Their computer model analyses the rate of change of words in English and the languages that share a common heritage.
The team says it can predict which words are likely to become extinct - citing "squeeze", "guts", "stick" and "bad" as probable first casualties.
"We use a computer to fit a range of models that tell us how rapidly these words evolve," said Mark Pagel, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Reading.
"We fit a wide range, so there's a lot of computation involved; and that range then brackets what the true answer is and we can estimate the rates at which these things are replaced through time."
Translation Services
This really has nothing to do with history, but I thought I would be a staunch self-promoter here as well as my other blogs:
As part of my on going adventures with the German language, I provide translation services from both German to English and English to German. If you are looking for someone who can translate any length of document for relatively cheap, then look no further!
English is my native language and I have 9 years of experience with the German language. I have lived, worked and studied in Germany. For typewritten or digital documents, websites or anything else digital, I charge US $0.08 or 0.06 euros a word. For handwritten documents, I will need to see the document before I can provide a price as handwritten documents can be far more difficult to decipher.
Please contact me at seifertalex [at] gmail [dot] com. If you would prefer to contact me by phone, please first contact me by e-mail and I will send you my phone number.
Happy New Year
I know it's 14 days late, but better late than never!
Actually, I spent most of the holidays with my family and a friend of mine, both of whom live in a different state. I have not had time nor ability to make any updates to any of my blogs unfortunately. The good news is that I am back at my university and should have plenty of time now.
This semester I am taking a Native American studies class, so I might just be posting more about the Native Americans. We'll see how it goes though.
Beards of the 19th Century
A friend pointed out to me a comedic poster in the form of a family tree of different types of beards common in the 19th century. I've posted it below. Click on it for a bigger view.
Beard Poster
Back and Ready to Go
I apologize to everyone for such a long hiatus. I haven't decided not to blog, I just literally have not had time. I am finally back in the States and have plenty of material to post here. Get ready for some more!
Happy 4th of July!
Happy 4th of July everyone!
Again, I apologize for the lack of updates. I literally just have not had the time to keep up as much as I would really like to... I promise more posts are coming shortly....
The Delay
I apologize for the delay in posting. I just haven't had as much time as I would really like to. The next part of the Who were the real cowboys? series is well underway, I have just not had the time needed to finish it quite yet.
Currently, I am working on an essay for a literature course I am taking and I promise I will be more diligent in posting after I am finished with it.
-- Alex
The Forums are Open!
As I mentioned a couple of posts ago, I decided to open a forums page for general history-related discussion. They are now open!
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- I love the internet! Want to learn profanity in Latin? Wikipedia has an enormous article on it: http://t.co/cBQzFOXQ 1 week ago
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- Finally got a working title for my dissertation. I'm quick excited now! 1 month ago
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