Biography:

The purpose of this assignment is to move into a more complex topic
in more depth. It also gives us a chance confirm the theory of what we've

been reading about creativty and networking  to see if it applies in the case

of real people.  It also allows us to try out another heuristic(discovery)

pre-writing technique, Pentadic analysis. This technique

is useful for taking an in-depth look at any human situation from multiple

points of view. The larger goal is for you to be famliar enough with

Pentadic Analysis to use it effectively when you're working on an important

and complex project involving people; on this assignment, we'll use it as we did the
Tagmemeic Analysis last time: to find an interesting "angle" on your
subject. You can see more on how an idea is generated based on the

Frodo example here: http://people.ucsc.edu/~pmmckerc/penttry.htm

(I did this with media criticism in mind, but the principles are the same).

If the person you are researching is someone who operates in the domain you are thinking of doing your Insanely Great idea in, you may get some specific insights into how to make things happen there, but even if they are not, you can still use them as a sort of spirit guide (not unlike the medicine bundle idea in the reading) or mentor in your creative life (if you're still looking for somone, you might get some inspiration here). The paper will be assessed on how well you demonstrate understanding of the creative process, so make sure to include specifics quotes and concepts from the readings (minimum of four pages).

Knowledge Web

If you want to publish your biography on the K-Web (not required of course) , you’ll need to give a general overview of the person’s life and use the template below, since it has to fit into a database. If you can link your person to other people in the K-Web, this will help too (maybe you got some ideas in Six Degrees exercise).

This assignment will require more refined research skills as well, as
some of these people are rather obscure, and some lived so long ago
that records are not as available. Finding out the names of
siblings (brothers and sisters) can be especially challenging. In
fact, I have sometimes lobbied to remove these, as most of the time
they are not historically significant; however, they do act as a kind of quality
control: if the researcher does not seek out the best information (in
most cases a book-length biography), they can't fill in all the parts
of the template.  Some good research resources are on the course reading
list in the history section: http://people.ucsc.edu/%7Epmmckerc/crsbks.htm
If you have trouble finding someone, go to reference desk at McHenry

(or the Science Library if it's a science or technology person).

The bio template is more complex than the one we used for the Gateway.
You can access it http://people.ucsc.edu/~pmmckerc/biotempl.htm here or download it from http://k-web.org/public_html/content/person.doc and below.  General instructions for content researchers are here:

http://k-web.org/public_html/content/researchbrief.doc  (note: you don't need to sign up with content manager).

Bios will be assessed on completeness, quality of sources (please look for good multimedia links), legit use of sources (this includes both the reading on creativity, but also other sources you find, since we need to maintain our reputation with funders, schools and libraries, and we can't afford to get sued), and originality of approach, but the "bottom line" is realworld standards: does the K-Web editorial board think this is good enough to publish. You can see examples of published bios in the K-Web beta: http://209.177.152.220:8080/kweb-proto/   There's a similar version with basic search here:     http://209.177.152.220:8080/kweb-search   (in order to search, just overwrite the words in the location box with the last name of someone you're looking for).  Info on how to use this beta is at http://people.ucsc.edu/~pmmckerc/betahow.htm . In fact, the beta bios may help you in figuring out the connections between your person and the other people and things in the K-Web (If you are doing someone from the to do list, tell me so I can tell you who you need to mention in your bios, so that it links into the system).


Template:

ORDERBY-NAME: (Name best known by; e.g., Twain, Mark)

OTHER-NAME: (birth name, alias, etc.; e.g., Samuel Clemens)

BIRTH: (Date & Place; e.g., 3 September 1880, New York, New York, USA)

DEATH: (Date & Place; e.g., 3 September 1940, New York, New York, USA)

CATEGORY: (broad classification; e.g., Natural Sciences, Fine Arts, Military, etc.):

DISCIPLINE: (detail; e.g., Poetry, Opera, Statesman, Manufacturer, etc.):

ASSESSMENT:

LANGUAGE:

EDUCATION:

ACHIEVEMENT:

MAJOR-WORK:

PARENTS:

SPOUSE:

SIBLINGS:

CHILDREN:

DETAILS:


EXTRA-CONNECTIONS: These are people who are on the list http://k-web.org/content/catlist.htm, but not mentioned in your bio.

BIBLIOGRAPHY:

RESEARCHER: (your name followed by the number of hours you spent on the bio in parentheses)

RESEARCH DATE: (Month Year)

PROPOSED CONNECTIONS: (people you would like to see added as links to this bio and to the overall knowledge web; these bios are not on this list http://k-web.org/content/catlist.htm, so you are proposing that they be written)

AUDIO/VISUAL:
(please list any websites or other sources of multimedia you found in your research)