How to Use

Points Like A Man has been developed using Corpora, a plugin that connects to WordPress and provides access to and presentation of our performance records. Corpora was built by Dr. Bryan Tarpley, Associate Research Scientist with the Center of Digital Humanities Research (CoDHR) at Texas A&M University.

How to Search

  • Click the “Search” link at the top right of the homepage.
  • Scroll down to the catalogue table.
  • In the table is a search bar marked by “Search…”. Type in your search criteria and click enter.
  • After you click enter, the table will be updated with your search results.
  • You can also refine your search by clicking the drop-down menu and clarifying through which kind of information you are searching.
  • You can search by performance record title, actress name, theatre, play, or role.
  • To clear a search, click the “X” on the yellow button that appears above the search bar after a search has been made.

How to Search for Multiple Pieces of Information

  • You can search for multiple pieces of information using the same search bar.
  • This is useful if you are looking for a batch of performances, like if you were interested in seeing all of Sarah Siddons’s performances of Imogen at Drury Lane.
  • To do so, first search for the first type of information in the search bar, with “All Fields” selected in the drop-down menu. Click enter. Using the example above, we would first search for “Sarah Siddons.”
  • Once those results have populated, then search for the next type of information using the appropriate label in the drop-down menu. Click enter. We would then search for “Imogen” with “Role” selected in the drop-down menu.
  • You will notice that the search will then populate results for both “Sarah Siddons” and “Imogen.” You can continue to use this method until you find the results you are looking for. To finish the example, we would then search for “Drury Lane” with “Theatre” selected in the drop-down menu. Once we click enter, we would see all of the results for Sarah Siddons’s performances as Imogen at Drury Lane.

How to Browse Information

  • The number of performance records is listed at the top left of the table and the page navigation is located at the top right.
  • The catalogue table can be scrolled through horizontally by using the scroll bar at the bottom. This gives a quick view of record information, including record title, theatre, role, and performance date.
  • You can also click the pop-out box to the left of each table entry. This will open a new tab in your browser with the full performance record.
  • Please note that the date for each record is listed in year-month-day format. For example, “1751-01-03” is January 3, 1751.

How to Navigate the Performance Record

  • Each record in our database corresponds to a single performance by an actress in a single role. An actress may perform the role multiple times, in which case would produce multiple records for us.
  • At any point in your search results, you can click the pop-out box to the left of each table entry to open a new tab in your browser with the full performance record.
  • Each performance record includes the following information: unique record ID, the record title, the theatre, the source, the performance role, and the performance date. Each record features a unique record ID as well as a unique date. All other information may be duplicated in other records.
  • Clicking the theatre link from the performance record opens a new tab to show all of the performances at that theatre.
  • Clicking the source link from the performance record opens a new tab to show all of the records pulled from that particular source.
  • Clicking the performance role link from the performance record opens a new tab to show all of the performances of that role.
  • If you scroll down to the bottom right, under “Associated Content,” you will find a link for the actress name, listed as “Entity ID.” Clicking the actress name link will open a new tab for the actress profile. The actress profile features information including first and last name, as well as any associated names the actress used in her career.

Search Tutorial Video
Watch the following short video to learn how to search our catalogue, including how to search our table, access the performance record, and access actress profiles to see information like alternate names.

How to Cite Our Database
Here is the information necessary to cite a record from Points Like A Man.

  • Title: Points Like A Man: The Shakespearean Breeches Performance Catalogue, 1660-1900
  • Author/Editor: Alexandra E. LaGrand
  • Place of Publication: College Station, Texas
  • Publisher: Center of Digital Humanities Research (CoDHR), Texas A&M University
  • Date of Publication: 2023
  • URL: http://www.pointslikeaman.com
  • Page Number or Call Number: Record ID (e.g. DRUR-AYLI-1)