My Approach to Wikipedia

November 27, 2017 admin Leave a comment

Wikipedia for better or worse has become the global source for instantaneous reference. As Roy Rosenzweig noted “We have to pay attention because our students do”. (Can History be Open Source) We should pay attention because Wikipedia is ubiquitous. It is providing the common platform of information and more significantly has changed the way we access and think about information… we no longer have to memorize and learn basic facts because Wikipedia can provide them faster than we can remember them. Skipping the process of remembering facts does have consequences for critical thinking and application of knowledge. However, that is a different issue than the one at hand which is the more immediate issue of ‘What do we need to be aware of when reading a Wikipedia article?’

Wikipedia is great for common facts and dates! It is probably mostly reliable. When searching for a more comprehensive understanding of a fact, event, issue, or idea, it is a good idea to dig deeper into who is involved in the “construction” of the entry. The entries are created and corrected by ‘everybody’, but this ‘everybody’ is constituted by individual volunteers who have different goals (and differing amounts of time and interest in working with the entry). An individual, who has just become familiar with a topic, can be interested in demonstrating what they know about it. A knowledgeable expert might have corrected and clarified an entry; or someone could just be creating mischief and enter random information. It is useful to know that there is extensive information, but basically 4 pillars for contributors (identified by Rosenszweig) which shape the content of entries:

‘Wikipedia is an encyclopedia which summarizes and reports conventional and accepted wisdom on a topic that does not break new ground.’
‘Articles should be written from a neutral point of view’
While “The third “key policy” is simpler: “don’t infringe copyrights.” The reality appears to be that Wikipedia as a general source ignores attribution and often so do its users.
‘The fourth pillar of Wikipedia wisdom is “respect other contributors’.

According to David Auerback, “Wikipedia’s users serve collectively as legislature, executive, and judiciary” of its content. (“Encyclopedia Frown”). That is not fully true as Auerback indicates in his own blog, there are priority contributors, Wikipedia editors, and a slew of ‘bots’ that monitor and manage the site. What this information should mean to the user, is Wikipedia is “probably mostly reliable”, but it shouldn’t really be a primary source if one is writing a term paper or trying to gain a deep understanding of a subject. However it is a useful tool for quick references and as a lead to other resources for more information on the topic.

Going deeper than the surface with a Wikipedia entry requires asking a few questions: “How did the article develop, who has been involved in its creation and do I judge the information or resources to be reliable? These questions can be answered by accessing the full Wikipedia site (not just pulling the data from the search engine synopsis). At the top of the Wikipedia topic page there are tabs for: the Article, Talk, Read, Edit, and View History. These provide clarification as to who is involved and the context of the article. The difference between the Article Tab and the Read Tab appears to be sponsored links and information that are applied to the borders of the web page by Wikipedia itself. The Read Tab allows you to see just the article. The Talk Tab provides insight into what the larger community involved with the article interprets about what is going on with the article. This includes: links to larger Wikipedia Projects & how the article is being used; concerns regarding content, general comments, ideas as to how the site could be changed or improved, requests for additional content and notes about links. The Edit Tab is where the source code editing actually takes place. The View History Tab is the log of the edits (and meta data about them) where a user can see how the entry has been changed over time.

There are numerous advantages to checking the “History”. It is not hard to do once you know it is there. It reveals how the currency of the information in the article. It reveals the nature of the changes that have been made. The user can check into the authority of the contributors, sort of. Contributors to Wikipedia can chose to register or not. Contributors can choose to provide information about themselves or not. While examining the Wikipedia page for “Digital Humanities”, I found ‘Sophia Chang’, the most recent contributor, did not register. Therefore I have no basis on which to evaluate her authority except the quality of the immediate corrections – for which I would have to check alternative sources to ascertain their reliability. “Cluebot” had ‘reverted possible vandalism’ which alerted me that some information might be suspicious. Another contributor described themselves as “a student studying geology”. Since I was a geology minor in college and knew nothing about DH (Digital Humanities), I am skeptical of LuckyLukasS and the “SoftballJunkie”. On the other hand, Elijah Meeks, who launched the page in January 2006, is a Digital Humanities Scholar from Stanford University, has published extensively and linked his registration to his own Wikipedia page (which has its own history). Wikipedia provides several “tracking” devices in the History including the ability to look at statistics, search for specific revisions, search edits by user, etc. This helps a user verify the authority and reliability. ElKevbo, who has been a longtime contributor-editor, has advanced degrees in education and technology. Cheryl27, who did extensive revision of the site in 2016, also did not ‘register’, but her edits did a terrific job of reorganizing and updating the page. The “talk” surrounding her edits, questioned some of her choices, but did not substantially challenge her content or accuracy. Since the DH page, in the past month has been viewed an average of 423 times and edited 8 times daily, is still a very current and active topic; there is a highly likelihood that errors will be corrected quickly.

The current iteration of the Digital Humanities page reflects increasing maturity in the discipline of Digital Humanities (DH). In the early days of the website, the content was basically a definition that made the connection between a Humanities focus in content through the use of Technological tools. Listing of projects, resources and literature was fairly static and encyclopedic – consistent with the rest of Wikipedia in the early days. The first embedded file link (to a visualization map) is made March 7, 2006. Considering this site promoted the use of digital tools, the lack of visual connections demonstrates the limits of both the discipline and the Wikipedia platform. Through 2009 the majority of links were to external tools, resources and journals that demonstrated collaboration and the expansion of professional literature in DH and history projects that used digital tools. During the spring of 2010 there is an effort to emphasize the computing in DH, which is resisted by Simon Mahony, a DH scholar with a “Classics” background from the University of London. The fact that the discipline was emergent is demonstrated by continuous tweaking of the definition.

The period 2011- 2013 reflects the controversy of whether DH is a “professional” community and attributes that would demonstrate its “academic” credentials: concerns over liability & copyright (Dr. Oldekip), definitions of subfields and terminology (ElKevbo), arguments over size of projects ( Dancing Philosopher), literature fields, Centers and Resources appear and disappear. The page is occasionally visited by Wikipedia editors and clean-up bots and was frequently attacked in 2013. During 2013 there was also a notable expansion of named DH Centers – which indicates funding, stability and academic recognition. In May 2015, the “methods” section gets a visualization of the ‘Narrative network of U.S. Elections 2012’ which begins to demonstrate the product outcomes of DH. By Jan 2017, the page is giving a far more extensive reflection of the discipline (reflecting the editorial work of Cheryl27 & Cats and Things – a graduate student studying Wikipedia). The Table of Contents has been trimmed to manageable subheadings, a somewhat concise, detailed definition of the field has been created emphasizing tools and methods but retaining the collaboration of humanities and very sophisticated digital process and tools. The values and methods have become lists with explanations of the ideas such as “open access”, Computational methods, examples of project types and most significantly of the interaction between the processes of project and recognition of the impact of these processes in “creating new knowledge” – “Digital humanities is also involved in the creation of software, providing “environments and tools for producing, curating, and interacting with knowledge that is ‘born digital’ and lives in various digital contexts.” In this context, the field is sometimes known as computational humanities.”https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Digital_humanities&oldid=758451224

The page has been made visually attractive and informative by images and links to real DH projects that demonstrate the use of tools and the variety of types of projects (Digital Archives, Text Mining, Analysis and Visualization, Online Publishing. The organization of the discipline is demonstrated by having an established academic apparatus: a “history”, organizations, Centers & Institutes, Conferences and Publications, Guides, an extensive list of references and bibliography.

The result of all this activity is a page with a nice layout and ease of navigation. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_humanities The engagement of DH scholars, such as Johanna Drucker provided a foundation definition of the Digital Humanities that clearly identifies the blending of computational (more than just use of the computer) technology and the fields of humanities; has maintained and enhanced the quality and integrity of the information. I, as an individual new to the Digital Humanities, gained a basic understanding and recognition of the discipline. DH is a field where a deep knowledge of the data and experience with the tools is critical to understand fully what is happening in this processing and how the information limited or vast is being engaged, transformed and created. Wikipedia takes a community and the collaboration on the DH article is a good reflection of a community within that larger community.

Notes:

Auerbach, David. “Encyclopedia Frown.” Slate, December, 11, 2014.

Rosenzweig, Roy.” Can History be Open Source? Wikipedia and the Future of the Past.” The Journal of American History Volume 93, Number 1 (June, 2006): 117-46 a.

Reviews, Tools

Voyant, CartoDB, Palladio: Comparing Network Analysis Tools

November 1, 2017 admin Leave a comment

The goal of these three tools is the same to search and assemble large amounts of data into formats which users can easily manipulate to create visualizations of their data. The goal of these tools is to enhance research and help researchers provide hard data and evidence for their humanities projects. The tools help us shape new questions and provide additional options for the portrayal of “ideas of change”, show how people, ideas, organizations or events have common patterns and interactions all of which enhance the meaning and understanding of the data and the humanist’s ability to teach and share the insights from it.

Voyant focuses on text and identified collections. It inspires thinking into the nuanced meaning and use of words. This includes the “power words” within a text and also the auxiliary words which demonstrate a deeper level of language use in a particular context. Although targeted for the “new to digital technology humanist” and straightforward in its process; if one is really new to the processes and navigates off the script or attempts to add something, there are no ‘aids’ built into the system to help you easily answer questions or solve problems.

CartoDB is a network mapping tool or as Carto describes itself, “An open, powerful, and intuitive platform for discovering and predicting the key insights underlying the location data in our world.” (https://twitter.com/cartodb?lang=en) This is a more sophisticated program for a new user than Voyant because it has more “built in software” making it more accessible. CartoDB focus on the spatial aspects of the data – how it is related geographically. Layers can be added with new information to enhance the understanding of the connections between relationships. It is easy to switch between and add maps. Starting with basic geography, but using GIS reference and point placement, CartoDB makes the maps for you. It also projects the maps in different ways using widgets: ‘heat maps’ show concentrations of activities and ‘animated’ maps can demonstrate interactions over time and space, or demonstrate patterns and isolations. This map is very helpful for clear comparisons and relations.

Palladio describes itself a s a “platform” for network analysis. This platform has a number of tools and is organized around manipulating the corpus data. When I was using this platform, I had the feeling; I was using a very limited aspect of its capabilities. “It is designed to manipulate data the way historians think” this is useful for us historians who have trouble “organizing our research” in the same ways that Scientists and Social Scientists do. Palladio enables the contents, of seemingly incomparable elements, get turned into plotable graphs, maps and clouds (spatial comparisons for ideas and categories). Being able to manipulate the data without having to have the underlying programming expertise is magic. However creating the corpus of data becomes highly significant, more on this below. The user has to ‘trust’ the logic and ability of the programmer (that the description of what is being done with the data – is being done in the same way the historian “thinks” it is being done). Decisions are made regarding how to organize the data sets. Errors can result in huge consequences for interpretation.

When computers were first coming into popular use (1970’s & 80’s) the key phrase was GIGO (Garbage In/Garbage Out). Manipulating research is pretty powerful and the visualizations ‘lock in’ ideas more definitively than ‘discussion’ does. As I read about and worked with these tools, I was excited about how a project I am working on Women and Health Care in Cleveland would benefit by their use. The “tools” will provide quick ways to visualize the impact of location and intersecting relationships we have been struggling to describe. Each tool can help us see the data from a new perspective and solidify, highlight our findings or indicate new questions. But, these tools cannot fully explain all the “whys” of the locations; the personalities, beliefs, or causes of actions. Missing records from whole segments of Cleveland’s population would not be “factored in”. As I worked with the individual tools, it became evident how each of the projects that used them, needed to modify them to suit their own data and questions. The itemization of the “Grant Support” is evidence of the need for modification, and support for programmers and editors to work with the researchers so that the questions are being addressed thoroughly and potential problems recognized and documented so that we do not generate (in today’s vernacular) “Fake History”.

Utilizing multiple tools is one way to avoid egregious errors and explore the data more deeply. Use of Voyant on the text of the Slave Narratives reflected the use of language which evidenced the fact that the slaves being interviewed were mostly plantation based and isolated. CartoDB demonstrated that “Alabama” interviews were not conducted all over Alabama, but in pocketed areas. It also provided evidence that the numbers of interviews peaked in 1937 (but the data did not indicate why). The similarity and limitations of the script used in the interviews was evidenced in Palladio by a cloud diagram of topics. These tools provide amazing insights, enable analysis that would not be possible without the speeds of text manipulation and they are great aids to the craft of history.

Creative Commons Sources, Reviews, Tools

Playing with Palladio

October 31, 2017 admin Leave a comment

Just like a kid at a table, I was given some preformed clay and told to make some beautiful works. Not having to do “the set up”, Palladio was relatively easy to get “into” network analysis and start messing around. Palladio is a “general-purpose suite of visualization and analytical tools” that enables researchers to map and graph humanities data. (http://hdlab.stanford.edu/palladio/about/) When we are discussing data here we mean “corpus” (techie term – compilations for the rest of us) of, in my case, the historian’s research (people, events, addresses, dates, contacts, documents, etc.). The data can be vast amounts of material (text, photographs, tables, etc.) or relatively small collections. The software in the platform through the use of algorithms (sets of directions) transforms our element (node) into a “plotable point on a map or graph. The schema for assembling, disassembling and reassembling produces various kinds of maps, graphs, constellations all with the associated metadata accessible. These manipulations draw (“edges” for the techies) “connections and patterns” (for the rest of us) that can be seen. These “visualizations” foster enhanced understanding of the data itself and make obvious how elements within the data are connected or not and because of the ability to “play” (isolating “ALL” the variables and being able to test relationships or time series, in space or against a physical map) new questions are brought to the researchers mind, hypothesis can be verified and various problems or possibilities can be explored and addressed. Our ‘Ideas’ become pictures that enable us to work with them, without losing track of them, from various perspectives.

The designers of Palladio built it for mapping the correspondence metadata of a project called “The Republic of Letters” which explores the connections of Enlightenment Intellectuals and the transference of ideas through their letters. (Visualize massive amounts of text in multiple languages). Palladio understands the historian’s mind and methodology,

“It is an environment that supports thinking through data. Like so many historical sources, the (data) is incomplete in unpredictable ways. Historians work with fragments of information from the past, not complete data sets. ..tools need to support scholars in building an understanding of the historical material through working with it. To create Palladio, we had to externalize what is a very internal, individual, thought process. “ http://hdlab.stanford.edu/palladio/about/

My trial experience working with Palladio centered around a data set created by Prof. Robertson from the Works Progress Administration Slave Narratives. (https://www.loc.gov/collections/slave-narratives-from-the-federal-writers-project-1936-to-1938/about-this-collection/ ) Since I was able to upload ‘Palladio prepared data’, I was able to avoid a time consuming task of aligning my data for Palladio manipulation.

It was relatively fast and easy to create the primary table (main data set) against which other tables (elements of the data) could be manipulated. For the Slave Data, the primary data set was the Alabama Slave Interviews and the subtables were identifications of the former slaves that were interviewed and data about the interviewers. Once the tables are created, they can be analyzed with various tools including locating the slaves/interviews on a map, drawing connections between an interviewer and the slaves interviewed, creating network analysis of various types by the individual elements within the data sets. The “visualizations” I made included maps, string and cloud diagrams (okay I admit– I got interested and played with time series and graphs as well). It was fascinating and time consuming to try different arrangements that suggested unique relationships, impact of place and Slave occupation. Also revealed were limits in the veracity of the data (not a reliable reflection of slave tasks or a true reflection of statewide representation), but also new issues to consider, such as how does the gender of the interviewer impact the questions used in an oral history interview?

Palladio describes itself as “a tool for reflective practice.” Both Scott Weingart (“Networks Demystified” Blog December 5, 2013) and Ryan Cordell (“Reprinting, Circulation and the Network Author in Antebellum Newspapers”), call to our attention that compiled data has its issues, in the same way normal archival research has gaps and biases and snags. It is easy to see how visualizations could cause erroneous interpretations. And truly the data is just a picture of the facts and still requires interpretation as to its meaning and significance. So the mind and integrity of the historian is still crucial to good history…but new Playdough is always fun and creative!

Databases, Reviews, Tools

CARTODB The Power & Limits of Perspective!

October 25, 2017 admin Leave a comment

In Women’s Studies, we examine concepts from different points of view. Engaging in the idea that ‘it matters where you are standing’, because what you are experiencing shapes your interpretation of the problem or context. Indulging in the examination of a variety of perspectives does not always lead to a conclusion or an answer, but it imparts a fuller and more complex understanding of the issues being addressed.

CARTODB opens the opportunity for novice geeks to play with data and visualize information from a different perspective. The key word here is “visualize”. Mapping allows everyone! (if I were writing a grant I would say, ‘the general public as well as scholars and students’); to “see” human experience in new configurations. Ideas are sometimes hard to follow, but evidence for an idea can be provided by demonstrating connections and patterns and “placing” the idea onto a map. A created map is “a map” which displays information, but CARTO has widgets for interactive time sequences, pull ups for additional material or explanations for aspects of the map. The process of building the map, plugging in ‘layers’ (multiple data sets) of data into a ‘corpus’ (total collection), is exciting for the researcher because it allows them to “play” with ideas! For example, in analyzing the Slave Narratives using different map views (point identification, “heat” (concentration) or time sequencing) reveals different aspects of the Slave Narrative project – its limitations and biases as well as providing a great deal of information on the slaves and the interviewers. This type of mass collation and presentation preparation would take years without the speed of computing. But the computer cannot interpret the meaning of the data.

Mapping allows for the interpretation of large quantities of data, and the consultation of a wider scope of resources. (Tom Hitchcock “Historyonics”). The caveat being that the data has to be in a digital format, this is a limiting factor and the limitations of whatever ‘data set’ is being used should be recognized. Sharon Musher (in Oxford Handbook of the African American Slave Narratives) makes an excellent and pertinent reminder of how even a seemingly large and comprehensive set of information can be misleading in its content. Great questions that mapping answers are locations, patterns and relationships (who is where and when and how does that change over time). However mapping allows us to see the significance of these relationships in new ways. As in Digital Harlem, where the placement of a patrol officer on a street corner and involvement in traffic accidents can now be understood as intersections of racial politics. (Robertson).

A bonus is that skeptics of the value of history (like Tom Hitchcock) will have something concrete, built on numerical manipulation that they can “see” as evidence, because ideas may seem too fuzzy for them to comprehend. CARTODB is a fabulous tool for allowing the explorer of an event, a neighborhood, the spread of ideas globally, the impact of words, or as in the Slave Narratives…the impact of human actions, individually and communally, from more perspectives.

Make no mistake, working with CARTODB is interfacing with computing. It requires patience for the tedious and repetitive steps of data entry, learning the “tools” and patterns of operations within the program and is never as ‘intuitive’ as the newbie wants it to be. After my initial foray, I can see, as with my phone and Voyant, the more the platform is used, the easier, more fluid and of course faster the user will become. I just keep praying that eventually the very act of learning this type of tool will become more fluid. If you are a person that needs to understand the overall picture of the tool, some time spent in on-line helps and guides is worthwhile. If you are a person who is a digital native or who doesn’t get frustrated by getting stuck and starting over, dive right in.

Creative Commons Sources, Databases, Reviews, Tools

“Seeing” the Slave Narratives with Voyant

October 20, 2017 admin Leave a comment

Voyant Tools is a web-based text reading and analysis environment designed to facilitate reading and interpretive practices for digital humanities and the public. http://voyant-tools.org/docs/#!/guide/about

Voyant Tools is an entry point – software that allows you to do basic computer-assisted analysis of data.

Text or edited and prepared data can by studied and analyzed in new ways and ‘plotted’ so that it can be saved and shared with others. Using Voyant allows others to explore your data through interactive panels that can be inserted into online publications and presentations. Voyant can also be used as a development platform to design new forms of analysis and visualization. The main visualizations are: word frequencies, word clouds and “distinctive words”.

I am also including a link to the scatterplot for this corpus. Clicking on the “Analysis” option > Principal Component Analysis provides further evidence of the significance of “race” as a feature of slave experience. http://voyant-tools.org/?corpus=2d0c91a1da599627fea6d35d607795a0&view=scatterplot&stopList=keywords-96814a63d28a5e281f75e02c891dcdbe

The trends graph indicates the significance of location.

I found Voyant to be an interesting tool which will be of great use when texts are clearly comparative. It is great for collating data! It provides the ability to analyze text to see trends in language and usage. The word cloud is interesting and illustrative. In the Slave Narrative data set on which I was working the common words were Old (which I ignored as the subjects of the text were elderly), Come and Time. Whereas I would have expected more direct slave references which were secondarily popular. The nature of the documents (by state) also provided insight into regional variations, but also made me recognize the states from which the largest number of narratives was drawn, would bias the representations and conclusions. Understanding the Data (Musher, The Other Slave Narratives) is critical to recognizing the significance of patterns. Having a larger context besides the quantitative data is essential for interpretation. Also it became evident as I was working with the Data, that my choices were subjective and these choices would also “skew” the results…my lack of technical prowess also would play a role in the accuracy or distortion of the results.

For the new user….agh! I am sure this tool would be easy for humanists with digital strengths. For the digitally challenged, it is probably pablum, and a good entry point to Digital Mining and Modeling tools…but we are entering a “Brave New World” where the faint hearted must learn to persevere. I believe spending some time in the on-line guides would be very helpful. I played around the examples and information on Voyant’s website, but before attempting a larger project – I would try to learn to manage and navigate the tool better. Time being an issue, I could not do that. My simple tasks became time consuming, because if I tried to backtrack or change some aspect of the data my progress was lost. Trying to return to old screens or navigate between the tools was not as “friendly” as I hoped. Transforming from a historian who uses traditional sources of evidence to build up thesis and wider connections – I miss the library shelf (Underwood, Theorizing Research Practices). it is a dramatic change to reverse and drill down into the minutia of checked boxes, single characters and itemizing the search. The good new is that when you get interesting graphs or can make unexpected connections and conclusions…ya feel great!

“Learning is not attained by chance it, it must be sought for with ardor and diligence.” Abigail Adams

Creative Commons Sources, Databases, Reviews

A review of the American History & Life Metadata Search for Popcorn

October 2, 2017 admin Leave a comment

A search for related information about my Whirly Pop popcorn maker yielded: Popped Culture: A Social History of Popcorn in America” (Book)

It is very important that the Metadata mentions after the title that this object is a book. Since I searched for popcorn…it might have been anything.

The American History & Life Fields included the Author (Trudy Eden), the Source (H-Net Reviews in the Humanities & Social Sciences. Jul2004, p1-6. 6p.); The Historical Period (1830 to 1999); The Document Type (Book Review) ; Subject Terms POPCORN, NONFICTION, SOCIAL change; Keywords (Andrew F. Smith important as he is the author of Popped Culture), Reviews & Products (This took me to another review by Philip Hiscock in Ethnologies), Abstract, Notes (incl. Publication Information: Washington: Smithsonian Inst. Pr., 2001. 264 pp.), Author Affiliations (Department of History, University of Northern Iowa), ISSN (1538-0661), Accession Number (15099661)

This Metadata did not include a Description or Summary Field that would have given me an idea about the review. Although the Period was identified, the context of the object was not. A “Review” for social change is not the same thing as “Review” for ethnography (which only came from knowing the nature of the publications for the different reviews). The publication information did not let me know if the book was drawn from an exhibit or independent research on the topic – which might have been included as part of the exhibit).

I appreciated the embedded links made searching the related sites and information quick and easy.

The Author information and Reviews and Products information made it possible for me to “place” this review in some of the fields of history to which it belongs (ethnography and Social change). It did not tell me if the reviewer is a significant person in the field. The subject field was very limited as it did not lead me to any other potential resources or search terms for my Popcorn maker – like Cooking or any information about the location of the subject other than (America) or its connection to industries like theaters or circuses. It did not identify related materials (if it was in an exhibit) or if this book covered the entire history of popcorn or just a period of popcorn or if this was the epitome of Popcorn and there has been a decline since.

My search of the metadata of the American History & Life reinforces my conclusions described in my Search Review.

Reviews

Hopes gained and Lost – Review of American History and Life.

September 30, 2017 admin Leave a comment

American History and Life is described by EBSCO as: the definitive index of literature covering the history and culture of the United States and Canada, from prehistory to the present. With indexing for 1,700 journals from as far back as 1910, this database is without question the most important bibliographic reference tool for students and scholars of U.S. and Canadian history he database also includes citations and links to book and media reviews. Strong English-language journal coverage is balanced by an international perspective on topics and events, including abstracts in English of articles published in more than 40 languages.

Made up of indexing, abstracts, and full text. The copyright of the abstracts and indexing is owned by EBSCO Publishing and solely for the use of the individual patron of the licensing party.AHL is I agree with the review by Tom Gilsom in the Charleston Adviser that the database is a great resource but takes quite a while to learn to use effectively. It is worth learning, because despite its high cost Gilsom) it must package well, as it is widely available at institutions.

Searches are conducted through Boolean Operators (AND, OR, and NOT): and can be limited to a specific title; and/or restrict a particular publication year… Stopwords (articles, pronouns, and prepositions) and Parentheses control searches and without parentheses, a search is executed from left to right. The default fields for unqualified searches consist of the following: Abstract, Author/Editor, Country of Publication, Journal Title, Review Author, Series Title, Subject Terms, Time Period of Event, Title, and Translated Title. Index browsing allows the user to view all values that occur in specified fields in a database, along with corresponding hit counts. Tags for all fields included in the index browse feature. An Index Browse can also be completed by Author, Author supplied Keywords, Document type; Entry date; Geographic Terms, Headings, ISBN, Language, Publication Name and Year of Publication.

AHL is organized and structured following historical organizational methodology. The entries are instructional as well as informational using common periodization. Designed for student and academic researchers, they provide suggestions for key resources in the subject area.

My experience with AHL is that specificity or prior knowledge works best when searching this database, but the results are more general knowledge and sources then deeply academic.

Ebsco Host http://support.ebsco.com/help/?int=ehost&lang=en&feature_id=Databases&TOC_ID=Always&SI=0&BU=0&GU=1&PS=0&ver=live&dbs=,ahl Accessed 9/29/17

Gilson, Tom. “America: History and Life — Web Database Review.” The Charleston Advisor, vol. 1, no. 1, July 1999, pp. 11–12., Accessed 9/29/2017. Charleston.publisher.ingentaconnect.com/content/charleston/chadv/1999/00000001/00000001/art00006#expand/collapse.

Guides

Guide to Digitization: The Kitchen Experience

September 25, 2017 admin Leave a comment

More and Less and Lost. At one level, anyone can throw a picture up on a screen and call it a digital collection and it can be seen by lots and lots of folk. However, if one thinks about the image and the meaning and the purpose of presenting an image – throwing the collection up on the screen becomes much harder.

As a historian, I am usually trying to capture the essence of an object (or person or event or period) and I have done it with words. At various times, I have tried to “find” images that represent the meaning or feeling of I am trying to convey. I understand better why that is so difficult. First of all you have to have the right equipment for the task and good quality if you are trying to present something well. There is also the issue of lighting and placement (so there aren’t any shadows or reflections and the surroundings are what you want them to be. Aside from these tool issues, there remains the issue of how best to “capture” the object.

I have experimented with photographing an object and creating a video. What I discovered for myself is that both are significant and important in providing a visual record of in this case, an object from my kitchen. (I am proud of my abilities in the kitchen, but digitizing it is another matter). An image is an image, a visual ‘report’. While representing an object – it also distances you from it, because it only presents digital information (not touch, taste, smell or hearing). ‘When we ‘digitize’, we are also converting an analogue signal or code into a digital signal or code’ and since this is (increasingly)’ the bedrock of Digital Library holding and Digital Humanities Research’ (Terras Digitization and the Humanities). it is a good thing to be aware of what is behind the curtain.

Collections can be enhanced and minimized by digital scanning and OCR (Optical Character Recognition) – translate as having the computer read for you but it means turning text in a picture into text in a document…so that it can be printed on a page. (This is part of that more…more steps! More Time! More people will eventually see it? Many libraries and museums and families (my own) flocked to digitization as an easy way to preserve the past. However these collections are not “free”. They still have to be maintained, the technology changes, the original image degrades and if your are an institution, copyright can become an issue. Another issue for institutions is the standardization of the product, so the industry has to agree on guidelines and processes.

Back to the kitchen! My assignment is to create a digital collection of objects. The historian at work again – I wanted to use objects of significance and beauty and interest….and okay (remember the technologically challenged part) the first step of the assignment got to me and then I just needed to get the project done in the time frame I had which are also true concerns in any reality – Time & Money. As Paul Conway describes in “Building Meaning in Digitized Photographs”, the process takes over. Taking pictures was relatively faster than taking the videos. Lighting and staging was an issue in both cases, but the video required movement (over, under, around) and that was an extra consideration. How does the process impact the meaning? It certainly impacted the choice of items included in the collection – what would photograph well? Which raises the second question after the project is assembled is this an accurate representation? (Of my kitchen? – tools partially, otherwise probably not). Because I chose the objects, it is probably more me, than if a stranger came in and chose the objects to digitize. My handwoven twig basket from France has no label – made in France. If I had used the audio in connection with the video, it could have added context and more description adding depth to what was an image. One can set a mood with Photography and Video, but not “capture” the rainbow of moods and meaning associated with an object.

It is harder to set a mood with text. The photographic image of the recipe was easy to read, but provided no context. The video allowed me to show the feel and size and range of the book, but I could not get the recipe readable. In the past, the book would be available to a small number of readers in a special collection. The institutions of the future will have digital copies available across time and space. But the OCR did not record the text accurately much less have the ability to interpret when the Italian was necessary compared with the English. A human transcriber would probably be able interpret, but make errors in the typing. Transferring the image across multiple platforms and uses would add access and new meaning (and potential uses of the recipe – like interpretation of diet or climate), but storage and degradation become problems for institutions – is it worth preserving this mangled copy of Ferrara’s Italian Recipes?

Also included in the scholarship of Conway’s article is the concern about the impact of remediation through multiple process or images. It was a concern of mine as I transferred the video from a video camera through my laptop to the course site (only to find out the files were too large). Then I said, heck with quality and used my phone. The videos were shorter, the color of the vinegar and the texture of the oil disappeared. Because I filmed in an area that was convenient & light for shooting, the aura of my kitchen disappeared. Any story created around the chosen objects, would have had to be a unique creation rather than a true memory or situation. I can now imagine the inconsistencies and rights and documentation of doing a complex project (Kenney and Rieger 29 in Conway) like assembling the Kitchen Collections of the 2017 3rd Cohort of the DPH, much less the assembly of an Artist’s collection of paintings across multiple museums or a major installation on race or gender utilizing digitized artifacts from multiple primary and secondary sources. EVERY ASPECT of the project requires the mediation of a decision…and it a professional exhibit from vastly different professional perspectives.

Digitizing my kitchen has changed me. The historian in me will now have to ponder more deeply on the accuracy and meaningfulness of video resources. The archivist will have to recognize and grapple with the issues of preservation and copyright on a vastly different scale than tactile collections. The educator in me…knowing that my students will try to gain their information from the visual aspects of assignments…agrees with the question by Paul Conway, “how do the video cues impact the willingness of a user to read the content of the image” and extends consideration to …how does the emphasis on digital visual representation impact the willingness of users to read at all and think more deeply?

Creative Commons Sources

Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America

September 12, 2017 admin Leave a comment

http://guides.library.harvard.edu/c.php?g=420228&p=2866121

The Location of the “Rights” Statement is at the bottom of the homepage: “Except where otherwise noted, this work is subject to a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License. Details and Exceptions.”

The Schlesinger Library contains Archival Collections of Famous Women, Radcliff Women and Women’s Activists including private papers, Family papers, Scrapbooks, Organizational records, Oral History Transcripts and recordings, Magazines and Newsletters.

The Women’s Rights Collection includes correspondence, journals, notebooks, speeches, financial documents, reports, minutes, membership lists, agendas, bulletins, pamphlets, manuals, articles, clippings, maps, scrapbooks, photos, posters, memorabilia, plays, books, etc. Highlighting the work done in Massachusetts, the collection primarily documents the suffrage movement and also the gains for women in government participation, protective legislation, and employment opportunities after 1920. Includes papers of and about little-known women, suffrage leaders, and professional women; records of suffrage groups; and information on international peace activities.

Public Domain Sources

The Cleveland Memory Project

September 12, 2017 admin Leave a comment

http://www.clevelandmemory.org/

The “Rights” Statement is linked from the bottom of the home page as: Acknowledgement & Copyright for Use of Photos

The Cleveland Memory Project is a collaborative effort between the Michael Schwartz Special Collections Library and Cleveland State University. The collection includes: Digital Exhibits, Digitized books on Cleveland History, Links to all things Cleveland, Photographs, Video and Sound recordings

Kim Lenahan’s Portfolio