Sarah Penrose
Pronouns:
Research Mentor(s): Tiffany Ng
Research Mentor School/College/Department: /
Program: UROP
Session: Session 2 (10:00am – 10:50am)
Authors: Sarah Penrose, Tiffany Ng
Abstract
Despite women being a crucial part of carillon history, their contributions are not nearly as recognized or visible to the public. The global project “A Century of Women and the Carillon†seeks to address this issue by bringing fifty women to the forefront of the carillon narrative. Our team conducted archival research primarily into digitized resources such as historic newspapers, interviews, and genealogical data. After conducting research, we used a non-traditional method of inviting authors from around the world to use this data to write the stories of the fifty women. This process was meant to radically increase global participation in this project and allow the writers to feel a sense of membership within our team. We compiled these stories into a GIS-focused, digital humanities platform, which enables each page to connect to geographical locations, such as women’s concert locations. Although over the past few years we have discovered over 100 women who were performers, writers, and philanthropists, we decided to only highlight fifty as a starting point for this project. “A Century of Women and the Carillon†is providing increased visibility for woman carillonists, which allows today’s women to learn about and look up to these historic women for the first time. Additionally, the project initiates the centennial celebration of women in carillon culture, as women were not as heavily involved in the carillon until 100 years ago. Our multimedia platform is geared toward a broad audience comprised of organizers, musicians, listeners, and the carillon community, and serves as a starting point for further exploration into women of carillon history.
