I am Dahlia Thomas, an MSI student in their last semester, vinyl record and K-pop album collector, and expert Splatoon 3 roller! My concentration in this program of study is Cultural Informatics. I was born in Sasebo, Japan, and live in Tampa, FL. I came to Tampa to learn more about Art History and Studio Art at the University of South Florida. I am interested in museums and hope to work for a large museum one day. When not working, crying, or completing assignments, I collect music memorabilia and play Splatoon 3!
I work for the University of South Florida as a Collection Specialist for Special Collections. Through this position, I get hands-on experience scanning, editing, and transcribing historical documents, images, and interviews mainly related to Florida’s environmental and natural history. I mainly work with oral histories but often edit material for USF. These collection items are posted in the Digital Commons @ University of South Florida website for researchers and students to use.
I have experience working with digital media through graphic design, digital drawing, 3D modeling, and sculpture, but I need to gain experience with modeling. Through my job and graphic design, I know royalty-free and creative commons images, 3D objects, and audio. I want to gain more experience in creating video projects and editing. I am excited to storyboard some video ideas I’ve had for a while.
Hi Dahlia, it’s nice to meet you! That is so interesting that you are able to work with historical documents and are wanting to work in larger museums. As a kid, I thought that museum’s were boring, but as I have gotten older, the information that you can learn from a museum is so fascinating and makes learning more tangible, it’s amazing! I am also crying when I’m not working or sleeping, so that’s cool to have in common. Did you spend time in Sasebo, Japan prior to moving to Tampa, FL? I have never travelled Internationally, but Japan is on my bucket list of places to visit, I would love to try the cuisine! What kind of music memorabilia do you like to collect? I have some vinyl records of Elton John, The Beetles, The Eagles and more, but that’s about it, I would love to hear what you have collected. Hope you have a great semester, it was great getting to know more about you!
The only vinyl that I have currently is David Bowie’s last album, “Black Star”. I was working for Barnes and Noble and I remember someone called from an NYC store to see if we still had the Special Edition, for himself, haha. I wasn’t able to find it, which made me sad, because I also wanted a copy for myself, so I got the next best thing. Then I had to buy a record player which I could never get to work even after I bought speakers and everything. All for one record. One day I’d like to improve my collection, I’m not sure about paying the going rate for new one’s though at $20 or more for one. Your story is a great example of various backgrounds and personalities are coming into the library system and the many different fields that someone can go into. It gives me hope as here in Florida and elsewhere book banning is becoming more prevalent with very extremist views. It gives me hope in the sense that I know I’m good company and will we all not go silently without a fight.