This project, drawing extensively on digitized public domain materials found in HathiTrust, pieces together fragments drawn from both Spain and Latin America. Not every mention of the phonograph or other devices, however, that appeared in print in the Hispanic world between 1877 and 1900 is included here. There is, for example, currently no systematic inclusion of legal or medical materials. I have also chosen to exclude the somewhat uninteresting instances where, alongside other devices such as the camera, the phonograph is cited as one marker among many of abstract notions like progress or modernity. 

The decision to present this work in a digital format stems from two primary concerns. The first is that, given that the materials I am working with are easily available to the public at large yet difficult to locate quickly, I wanted to create a work in which users could browse the collection of works as I have presented them while also being able to access and evaluate the materials for themselves. For this reason, the bottom of every page contains a link to the full text of the work. As a project that makes use of text, illustrations, and sounds, the second reason to present it in a digital format is so that this variety of materials is available in one place. Scalar in particular makes it easy to combine text and media in paths that can be arranged and referenced in any number of ways. In the future, as I expand the project's reach further into the age of recorded sound, such a platform will also allow me to incorporate new materials into previously established paths or even create new paths—which can themselves include old materials.