We welcome contributions in various formats. Having launched the project only a few months ago, we are still at a nascent stage. We are sharing and commissioning research in the form of two outputs – blog posts and online exhibitions. But we are open to developing more and different outputs, ones that we have not thought of yet, and ones that perhaps you might be able to develop with us. This page focusses on providing more information for those interested in contributing blog posts to our platform. But if you’d like to get involved in other ways and have ideas for outputs that you’d like to discuss with us, then please get in touch with us at digitallab@maa.cam.ac.uk.
Style Guide
We have a very simple style guide. First and most importantly, we ask that all authors wishing to contribute a blog post begin with an object or a collection at MAA, and from thereon explore wider themes, histories, narratives, and concepts. Each post should ideally aim to be between 500–2,000 words long. But if you find yourself wanting to write more, then please break these into shorter posts that we can publish as a series.
We ask that you prioritise the use of local terms for material culture. The local term for an object, preferably in the local language and script, should be followed by its Latinisation and translation in brackets. We understand that for some objects it might be difficult to find local terms. If you are struggling to do so, then please do get in touch as we might be able to help you.
Our platform is largely used by the general public, so we request that you write in a way that is intellectually accessible to a wide audience. This does not mean dumbing down things. It simply means defining and explaining everything properly in order that everyone can follow your point or argument.
Please write out numbers one to ten, and all other numbers from thereon as numbers, as for example, 11, 12, 15, 20,000, etc. and 12th, 19th, 20th, 25th, etc.
Images of objects and photograph can be found on MAA’s online collections portal. Please feel free to download and use them in your posts, and aim to make them as visual as possible. All images should be captioned in the following format:
Figure [image number]. Description of the object. Place. Period. Source. MAA [accession number for objects or IDNO for photographs].
Please hyperlink the accession number or the IDNO with each object’s URL. If you are using images from other collections or those that have been used in other blog posts, articles, or academic papers, then please caption them in the same format. Please ensure, where possible, to include the accession numbers of objects, a link to their online catalogue record, and a link to the post or article from which the image has been sourced.
Figure [image number]. Description of the object. Place. Period. Source. [accession number for objects or IDNO for photographs with hyperlinked with their online catalogue record]. Source: [source of image].
We encourage you to share your draft as a Google Doc so that we can comment, edit, and work collaboratively with you. But if you feel more comfortable using a different format, then please feel free to do so.
Senior Curator in World Archaeology Jimena Lobo Guerrero Arenas, looking at some archaeological objects wit two visiting researchers.
Object Lists
We have curated objects lists that help provide an overview of objects and collections relating to the different themes of our project in the collections at MAA. We are constantly in the process of developing more lists, so do watch this space.
