COVID-19 Documentation Project Now Available

Press release from Kennesaw State University:

Mar 16, 2021

COVID-19 Documentation Project Now Available

Personal narrative contributed by KSU Student Phaïna Dubuisson to COVID-19 documentation
project.

Stories and photographs from the KSU community about the early months of the COVID-19
pandemic.

KENNESAW, Ga.
(Mar 16, 2021) — One year ago this month, the lives of the entire KSU community changed rapidly as
the university was forced to close its doors due to COVID-19. In April 2020, the KSU
Archives and Special Collections began collecting stories of how our University community
was experiencing the pandemic. Students, faculty and staff submitted personal narratives,
photographs, video, and classwork over the following month documenting their own experiences
in the early days of the virus.

As we reflect on one year of the pandemic, the Archives is now making those contributions
available to the public in SOAR as the KSU and COVID-19 collections.

The collected personal narratives and photographs submitted to our documentation project
are now available as Documenting COVID-19 and the KSU Community. Individuals contributed stories about social distancing, learning and working from
home, balancing family life with work and school, observing milestones in quarantine,
the impact of the pandemic on physical and mental health, the intersection of the
virus with current events, and more.

Several of our KSU faculty incorporated student reflections on the pandemic into their
curriculum. Responses from ENGL 1102 students on how our use of words like "lockdown,"
"masks," and "social distancing" have changed during the pandemic, as well as reflections
on class readings in the context of current events by British Literature students,
were contributed by Dr. Mary Behrman. See The Role of Words in the Age of Coronavirus and The Power of Poetry for their contributions.

Finally, graphic design students from Donna Colebeck’s ART 1100 students designed
representations of the virus as 2D art inspired by the Orphism movement. Their artwork
and artist statements are available as Orphism and Coronavirus-inspired Designs.

Want to contribute to this project, or contribute again? The Archives is continuing
its efforts to collect stories and reflections on the COVID-19 pandemic. Go to Documenting COVID-19 and the KSU Community: 2021 to submit your contribution.

This press release was produced by Kennesaw State University. The views expressed here are the author’s own.