Intro to Digital Humanities Workshop
- 1. Intro to Digital Humanities Workshop Villanova University May 29, 2014 Deb Boyer debsting@gmail.com @debsting
- 2. * Workshop Agenda • Intro to digital humanities • Review key themes and project examples • Workshop 1: Omeka for online exhibits • Workshop 2: Basic mapping • Workshop 3: Data visualization and analysis • How to integrate DH into the classroom? • Additional resources
- 3. What are the Digital Humanities? 1959
- 4. Nothing but a fad A set of methodologies The use of digital tools for humanities research Just a construct Humanistic inquiry using digital technology An interdisciplinary community of practice A current term that will soon be how we refer to the humanities in general A big tent where all are welcome The research we’ve always done just with faster tools A brand new field
- 5. * Does it matter? • Define by its values - Openness, collaboration, collegiality, connectedness, diversity, experimentation - Lisa Spiro • http://whatisdigitalhumanities.com/ • Day of DH - open community publication project - http://dayofdh2014.matrix.msu.edu/
- 6. * The History of DH* • Began as “humanities computing” – primarily focused on concordances, electronic texts • 1949 - Father Roberto Busa and the works of St. Thomas Aquinas • 1960s – Slowly more textual analysis projects, first conferences, first university centers • 1970s-mid-80s – More consolidation of projects, sharing of ideas, regular conferences *Susan Hockey - “The History of Humanities Computing” and Matthew Kirschenbaum - “What is Digital Humanities and What’s It Doing in English Departments”
- 7. The History of DH • mid 1980s-early 1990s – Personal computers, TEI (text encoding initiative), list-servs • mid 1990s – present – Rise of the internet, digital library collections, multimedia, web publishing • 2001 – 2005 – First mentions of digital humanities, Association for Computers in the Humanities and Association for Literary and Linguistic Computing merge into the Alliance of Digital Humanities Organizations (ADHO)
- 8. The History of DH • 2006 – NEH launches the Digital Humanities Initiative • 2008 – NEH forms the Office of Digital Humanities • 2009 – Modern Language Association Annual Convention includes several key DH presentations • Today – Digital Humanities (DH) common term, digital scholarship/digital liberal arts on the rise
- 9. Digital Humanities vs. Digital History • Digital history often focuses on the presentation of material, access, and preservation. • Spatial mapping vs. topic modeling/text mining • Inclusion of cultural institutions (but not always) • Not really clear and not really crucial
- 10. Provide new ways to Access Resources Philadelphia City Archives Photo by Deb Boyer
- 11. New methods for Historical Analysis and Sharing DataVisualizing Emancipation http://dsl.richmond.edu/emanci pation/
- 12. Explore connections with New Audiences and New Media The Ward - www.dubois-theward.org/
- 13. Key Areas • Digitization and increased access to primary sources • Online publishing and open data • Text analysis • Spatial mapping • Network mapping • Data visualization • Multimedia and digital storytelling • Crowdsourcing and user generated content • Gaming
- 14. Let’s Get Critical Student Photo - 1913
- 15. Key Debates • Too focused on doing/making at the expense of theory and criticism (more hack, less yack) • Overly obsessed with data at the expense of interpretation • Elitist, opportunistic, and self-aggrandizing • A place to escape - DHPoco (Postcolonial Digital Humanities) - http://dhpoco.org/
- 16. Is This All Just About the Money? City Fair - 1967
- 17. (My) Benefits of DH • Interdisciplinary • Encourages experimentation • Collaborative • Promotes discussion and outreach with diverse audiences • Provides opportunities for multiple forms of narrative
- 18. How do you become a digital humanist? Founders Week - 1908
- 19. 1. Say you are one and join the conversation 2. Spend some time learning new tools 3. Make mistakes and try again
- 20. Getting Started • Bamboo DiRT - http://dirt.projectbamboo.org/ • Intro to Digital Humanities - UCLA • “Getting Started in the Digital Humanities” – Lisa Spiro • “How Did They Make That?” – Miriam Posner • A Short Guide to the Digital Humanities • “Tales of an Indiscriminate Tool Adopter,” ProfHacker – Michelle Moravec
- 21. DH in the Classroom Typing Class - 1928
- 22. Basic Guidelines • Don’t assume students have technical skills • Perhaps conduct technical survey/skills assessment early in semester • Tie into existing educational goals – no technology for technology’s sake • Start small and use existing free tools
- 23. Wikipedia • Discuss collaborative content creation – who is writing what everyone reads? • Neutral point of view • Linking to resources • Wiki formatting • GLAM:WIKI, Rewriting Wikipedia, etc
- 25. Class and Student Blogs • Go beyond reading journals in digital form • Tie into course goals – summarized version of research paper, info on group project, etc • Opportunity to discuss audience, presentation, tone, content, article length • Become part of the online conversation - immediacy • Maybe it’s not a blog at all – Tumblr, Twitter, Flickr, digital storytelling
- 27. Critiquing Digital Tools • Find a digital project/website and analyze it like a text, primary source, etc • Digital tools (databases, visualizations, maps) are arguments. What decisions did the creators make? • Who is the audience? How has the project been designed or constructed with their needs in mind? • How could the tool be used differently, improved, or expanded?
- 28. Working with Digital Primary Sources • Reading primary resources in new format • Options to participate/crowdsourc e • Connect to digital literacy • Critique formatting and analysis The Ward - http://www.dubois-theward.org/
- 29. Build Something
- 30. Intro Tools • Omeka - http://www.omeka.net/ • Google Maps Engine Lite - https://mapsengine.google.com • Timeline - http://www.simile- widgets.org/timeline/ • TimelineJS - http://timeline.knightlab.com/ • TimeMapper - http://timemapper.okfnlabs.org/ • Voyant Tools - http://voyant-tools.org/
- 31. Learning More Southwark Elementary School - 1912
- 32. Local Resources • PhillyDH - http://phillydh.org/ • PhillyDH@Penn - Friday, June 20, 2014 - http://penn2014.phillydh.org/ • THATCamp Philly - http://thatcampphilly.org/ • GLAM Café Meetup - http://www.meetup.com/GLAM-Cafe- Philadelphia/ • Aurelius Digital Humanities Initiative, Falvey Library • Many, many local tech, geospatial, and design meetups
- 33. Conferences and Workshops • Alliance of Digital Humanities - http://adho.org/conference • Digital Library Forum - http://www.diglib.org/forums/ • HILT – Humanities Intensive Learning and Teaching - http://www.dhtraining.org/hilt/ • Museums and the Web - http://www.museumsandtheweb.com/ • THATCamp - http://thatcamp.org/
- 34. Key Books • Debates in the Digital Humanities – Edited by Matthew Gold • Digital History: A Guide to Gathering, Preserving, and Presenting the Past on the Web – Daniel J. Cohen and Roy Rosenzweig • Writing History in the Digital Age – Edited by Jack Dougherty and Kristen Nawrotzki
- 35. Key Online Publications • Digital Humanities Now - http://digitalhumanitiesnow.org/ • Digital Humanities Quarterly - http://www.digitalhumanities.org/dhq/ • Journal of Digital Humanities - http://journalofdigitalhumanities.org/ • ProfHacker - http://chronicle.com/blogs/profhacker/