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Georeferenced Cultural Repository Inventory at the Smithsonian Cultural Rescue Initiative

Over the last three weeks I began working in earnest on the Conflict Culture database as an online intern for the Smithsonian Institute and University of Pennsylvania Museum. This internship satisfies the semester requirement for fieldwork in the field of Digital Humanities as part of the post-graduate certificate in Digital Humanities at George Mason University. Although the government shutdown delayed a bit of work at the beginning of the semester, things are now running smoothly. I was given Ireland as my assigned country for the Conflict Culture project. This project is both ambitious as well as exciting and involves collaboration from nearly twenty organizations and institutions. When asked about this project, I often paraphrase the mission as stated on the homepage:

Joined by researchers from around the world, the Conflict Culture Research Network supports rigorous, interdisciplinary research that examines how conflict impacts the culture of communities experiencing violence.

In terms of my own progress, there are 319 sites for Ireland and the excel workbook contained previously entered data mostly related to coordinates and some other basic categories. While it may not seem difficult, the process of verifying and making minor edits to existing content has been tedious and time consuming. That said, the success of this project and the ultimate outward-facing data sets available to the public are dependent on precision and accuracy. For these reasons, I have been very careful in checking and verifying data. I am happy to report that I have nearly completed my work on the existing data for Ireland. I will then shift to researching and collecting new data to complete the documentation for each and every heritage site and site of historical and cultural significance for Ireland.

One cultural heritage site that I found interesting was the De Valera Museum and Bruree Heritage Centre, located just south of the city of Limerick.

http://visitballyhoura.com/index.php/2015/07/22/de-valera-museum-bruree-heritage-centre/

The De Valera Museum and Bruree Heritage Centre is dedicated to Eamon de Valera, former president of Ireland and one of the country’s most famous statesmen.

This image of Eamon de Valera in 1922 is from the National Photo Company collection at the Library of Congress. There are no known copyright restrictions on the use of this work. Click here to access the image file and record.

Eamon de Valera’s political career spanned over half a century, from 1917 to 1973. He served several terms as the head of government and led the efforts to ratify the Constitution of Ireland.

One of de Valera’s most famous speeches was entitled “The Ireland that we dreamed of.” Click here to listen to the audio of the 1943 speech, below is an excerpt sponsored by Raidió Teilifís Éireann (RTE), Ireland’s National Public Service Broadcaster:

“…The Ireland that we dreamed of would be the home of a people who valued material wealth only as a basis for right living, of a people who, satisfied with frugal comfort, devoted their leisure to the things of the spirit – a land whose countryside would be bright with cosy homesteads, whose fields and villages would be joyous with the sounds of industry, with the romping of sturdy children, the contest of athletic youths and the laughter of happy maidens, whose fire sides would be forums for the wisdom of serene old age. The home, in short, of a people living the life that God desires that me should live…”

The museum houses a collection of his personal belongings, as well as a wide range of articles which record life in Bruree in the early twentieth century. There is also a visitor centre where Eamonn de Valera grew up.  In the village of Bruree, the cottage where he lived has been preserved and the national school he attended houses another museum dedicated to his memory.

I look forward to learning more about Ireland in this process and to contributing to this very important project.

Mary Ellen Pethel, Ph.D.
Harpeth Hall School, History Dept. Chair, Digital Humanities Coordinator
Belmont University, Honors Program Adjunct, Global Leadership Studies Fellow

References:

“De Valera Museum & Bruree Heritage Centre” Visit Ballyhoura  (Ballyhoura Failte: Ballyhoura County, Ireland), 2018, http://visitballyhoura.com/index.php/2015/07/22/de-valera-museum-bruree-heritage-centre/.

“Eamonn De Valera, head-and-shoulders portrait, facing front,” Library of Congress (LOC Prints and Photographs Division: Washington, D.C.), 1922, http://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/00652544/.

“The Ireland That We Dreamed Of” 1943.” Éamon de Valera (1882-1975). RTÉ Archives. March 1943.

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Oral History and Public History

Oral history has, in the words of Doug Boyd, “grown as a resource for historical and cultural documentation by both academic and community scholars” (OMHS: Enhancing Access to Oral History for Free). However, public historians, librarians, and archivists are still determining the best and most cost-effective way to publish oral histories online and making them available and navigable to the general public as well as scholars. Boyd’s work with the Louie B. Nunn Center for Oral History at the Kentucky Digital Libraries is making great strides in achieving the above goals. This is due in large part with the development of the Oral History Metadata Synchronizer (OHMS), which made its online debut in 2008. The OHMS “inexpensively and efficiently increases access to oral histories by locating precise segments of online audio or video that match a search term entered by a user” (Ibid). The OHMS system is open-source and can be linked to other course management systems and platforms such as Omeka via plug-in. OHMS and how it works is best described in a two-minute video (OHMS Tutorial) that features the following graphic:

The American Folklife Center launched the Occupational Folklore Project (jointly sponsored by the Institute of Museum and Library Services). It engages folklorists, oral historians, librarians, museum professionals, independent scholars, and other researchers according to Nancy Groce and Bertram Lyons. It is an amazing, and amazingly ambitious project that ultimately seeks to engage larger institutions including non-profit organizations, large libraries, and universities. They have divided the project’s online instructions and protocols into two parts: publicly accessible pages on the AFC/LOC website and the custom-designed online catalog IDF template (Interview Data Form). While very specific and detail-oriented, this five-step process might prevent participation because it requires some technical expertise and extensive time beyond just the interview and oral history indexing/transcription itself.

Another project that is managed by the American Folklife Center is the Veterans History Project. While the Occupational Folklore Project is still in the beta-stage, the Veterans History Project has achieved success using a slightly different, less technologically sophisticated but more straightforward model. Those interested in participating or conducting an interview simply request a Veterans History Project Interview Kit. There is also an accompanying 15-minute video tutorial (Veterans History Project). In my opinion, the Veterans History Project protocol and process is more appealing and will attract greater participation from the general public.

Digital technologies have simplified and complicated the practice of oral history. Oral history as part of digital projects is more accessible and user-friendly (for consumers and well as crowdsourcing participants) because of open-source systems and programs such as OHMS. At the same time, incorporating oral history into digital projects adds another layer of technology that must be maintained, updated, and made compatible with the larger project cms or infrastructure. While oral history is not a major focus of Nashville Sites, it could be a consideration down the road. Finding Nashvillians who witnessed a historic event or have family connections to important figures connected to the historical markers could enhance the project. It would also be a way to make the project more attractive and relevant to residents of Nashville (as a target audience).

Works Cited:

Boyd, Doug. “OHMS: Enhancing Access to Oral History for Free.” Oral History Review 40.1 (2013): 95-106. Published on March 20, 2013.

Bertram, Lyons and Nancy Groce. “Designing a National Online Oral History Collecting Initiative.” Oral History Review 40.1 (2013): 54-66. Published March 26, 2013.

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The History of Digital Public History

1) How has the work of digital public history changed over time?

Digital Public History, as an emergent field, has dramatically evolved over its short twenty-year history. Here is a summary from each of the three periods explored as part of Module Two:

1998-2001
There is a great deal of experimentation in this phase. Examples include crowdsourcing, full-text, digitized images, zoom in/out functions, audio, apps, and a variety of organizational tools through which to view and present digitized historical materials. The scope of each of the three projects surveyed was different. Two focus on specific events, i.e. Chicago Fire and NYC blackouts, while the other focuses on a specific topic, i.e. Af. Am. pamphlets from turn of the twentieth century (Progress of a People). All three are appropriately narrow in scope, but each builds out and has updated (or not) differently. The NYC Blackout Project site looks like it hasn’t been updated since 1998 and the Chicago Fire & Web of Memory site perhaps needs to be reorganized completely after growing online for nearly twenty years.

2002-2009
A definite move to use java/flash was evident from 2002-2009 digital public history projects. Sources are presented in a more visual and interactive way, but formatting and navigation is intended for desktop users. These projects are based on larger events and seem to focus on the notion that we should “complicate” history. This is part of the larger effort to move beyond the typical characters studied in U.S. history and American culture. This trend to uncover troubling parts of our historical narrative are equally, if not more, important. Projects during this phase include: Slavery in New York, Raid on Deerfield, A More Perfect Union: Japanese Americans and the U.S., and Jasenovac: Holocaust Era in Croatia.

2010-2015
More recent digital public history projects are less about presentation of a set or distinct group of materials with a somewhat prescribed lesson or learned outcome and more about engagement through contribution and feeling invested in the project. Formatting also move past java and flash and is friendlier for different sizes and types of screens. These project are much, much bigger — tackling millions of pages or sources rather than presenting a thematic “online” exhibit or digital project. This phase shows that digital projects are fluid rather than final. Examples include: Lincoln at 200, Bracero History Archive, Manifold Greatness: Creation and Afterlife of the King James Bible, and Operation War Diary.

2) What should qualities we be looking for as markers of good digital public history work?

The qualities of good digital public history are in many ways the qualities of two complementary goals of historians more generally: effective teaching using primary sources and student engagement leading to a deeper understanding of history. This involves the organization and presentation of primary source materials in a way that encourages students and the general public to become “detectives” and to think critically and historically about primary sources as well as context, subtext, and significance. For more see Sam Wineburg’s “Thinking Like a Historian” (TPS Quarterly).

3) What are promising new directions in this field?

Promising new directions in the field of Digital Public History include more clearly delineated categories for the projects themselves. Several categories have emerged and include: teaching resource, virtual tour or exhibit, archival body of sources, digitized sets of data, and blog/essay. Another promising development is the more reliable and sustainable use of open-source technology rather than plug-in or software based projects that can limit the user experience. Crowdsourcing projects or creating large digital  collections should be wary of data-entry inconsistencies and should clearly identify the purpose and potential use of the sources being digitized.  Conversely, digital projects aimed at K-12 learning  should be careful not to be too limited in scope. As a whole, Digital Public History remains a dynamic field, full of possibility, and intentionally wide-ranging.

 

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