DH Project Story

Submitted by iamdan on Tue, 01/14/2020 - 11:12

Compose a print-based report on a digital humanities project. There are two components to the task: 1) conducting research to gather background information relevant to the project under study and 2) providing descriptive text that captures key aspects of the project. There is also a twist: you should compose your report using a storytelling mode.

Some of the steps include:

Identifying a project. You can choose any project you like. You may already have a project you are interested or involved in. Or you may pick a project that resonates with some component of digital humanities you want to learn more about (e.g., digital archives, text encoding, GIS, sound studies, etc.) Perhaps a project from a reading strikes your interest. Also, the definition of project is quite open: it might be an online archive or canonical DH project; it might be a piece of software; it might be a book or collection of texts; it could be an event or movement; etc.

Conducting research. Once you have a project, locate and read at least three relevant sources. Sources might specifically discuss the project under study. Or they might touch more broadly on methods or aspects associated with the project. You can also include sources related to concerns of DH broadly. (When finished, and depending on the mix, you may well have more than three sources.)

Describing the project. Spend some time reviewing the project using a mode of digital analysis. This involves detailed description that might tend toward rhetorical or forensic analysis. What does the project look like? How does the project work? What are its main components? How do people engage with the project? You may want to compose notes or otherwise capture this kind of description taking of the project.

After (or in conjunction with) the activities above, compose the story. The twist in the assignment asks you to craft this composition as something other than the typical research report. You will still use text, but take more of a storytelling approach. Here are two possibilities:

Journalistic. Follow some variation of the five Ws (and an H) to tell the story, composing after asking about the project: who, what, where, when, why, and how. These elements should enable you to cover most everything you need to help readers get a good sense of the project. If one or two of the elements don't make it into the text, it's fine.

Dramatic. Take more license with the storytelling directive. You might consider characters involved in the project, tensions or conflicts, problems encountered, resolutions, etc. You might personify the project itself and develop a kind or plot or arc, describe settings, develop themes, use dialog, etc. If you choose this path, you may also want to acknowledge and develop a more fictional approach. You hyperbolize or take creative license to make a point; just add a note indicating these aims. If you want to push the assignment further, you can consult about other possible formats (screenplay, epic poem, etc.)

You will have to figure out the best way of incorporating your research into the story. With the journalistic approach this should be straightforward and you can use quotes, footnotes, etc. For the dramatic approach the research may be woven in more implicitly. Or perhaps some hybrid model will work.

Please include at the end or submitted along with the report a list of sources used. Aim for about five or six double-spaced pages with a twelve point font.

Below are some resources for your research into the project. Of course, you can also use materials from the library, online, etc.

When finished, submit the project as a document using the DH Project Story option on our web site. Submit your draft before class on Thursday, January 30th.
 

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Submitted by phoebepowers on Wed, 01/15/2020 - 16:49

#MeToo signifies the global movement that emerged as a means for survivors of sexual assault to publicly speak up on the abuse they have suffered. As Amanda Strauss says in Harvard's Schlesinger Newsletter, "The digital footprint of #MeToo in the past year measures more than 19 million English-language Twitter posts and thousands of news articles and personal testimonials." Harvard's Schlesinger Library has begun a large-scale project to comprehensively document #MeToo to ensure the preservation of the vast content, including "social media, news articles, statements of denial and/or apology, web-forum conversations, websites, and related hashtags, along with more-traditional papers and records."

In my project I am hoping to detail the step-by-step of this online movement and also potentially offer insight on means of using digital platforms to create your own social or political movements. 

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Submitted by Shawna Sheperd on Thu, 01/16/2020 - 00:45

http://dpoetry.com/

http://www.secrettechnology.com/poem_cube/poem_cube.html

http://www.secrettechnology.com/

Jason Nelson is a digital poet that strives to create new ways to structure, organize, and interact with new ways of thinking and creating. He focuses on the experience of poetry rather than the description of it. He has worked on multiple poetry exhibitions or web publications that focus on interfaces. This genre as a whole is an emerging language practice that can be seen as an attempt at renewal / rejuvenation of preexisting artistic forms (sound, visual, verbal).

In my project, I hope to explain the origins and movement of digital poetry and any significant impact the consequent digitalization has created. I am interested in particular with interactive poetry interfaces, such as Jason's "Poetry Cube" and "a tree with managers and jittery boats."

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Submitted by alexmorton on Thu, 01/16/2020 - 03:22

 

https://www.jmir.org/2009/1/e11/

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2210600617301090

Every year, Twitter and Google are quite literally plagued by tweets and search queries about the newest disease or iteration of it (Everyone remembers the media takeover after cases of Ebola virus were found in the US circa 2014). Features like Google Trends help track searches surrounding these outbreaks and Twitter provides insight into how prevalent concern is within a population with its trending #hashtags. Exploring how advantageous these readily accessible programs can be to not only inform the population about potential risks, but actually track incidences of disease, could make significant use out of existing platforms that people use regardless of age.

Through my project, I hope to investigate the potential (and existing) influences of disease outbreak on searches across various social platforms using programs like Google Trends to explore various population response. Furthermore, questions about how this data could be used or why it might be dangerous would be considered. 

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Submitted by KaylaGibson on Thu, 01/16/2020 - 03:40

D&D Beyond is an "official digital toolset and game companion for Dungeons & Dragons fifth edition." It's a gathering place that includes "digital tools like a character builder and digital character sheet, monster and spell listings that can be sorted and filtered, an encounter builder, and an interactive overlay Twitch Extension. In addition to official D&D content, it also provides the ability to create and add custom homebrew content. D&D Beyond also publishes regular original video, stream, and article content, including interviews with Dungeons & Dragons staff, content previews and tie-ins, and weekly development updates." On top of that, it has a forum where players and dungeon masters (DMs) alike can discuss new updates, pose questions about rules, character ideas, and/or homebrew content, and just generally connect over a game that has roots going back to the 1970s. 

Dungeons & Dragons is considered, traditionally, to be a pen(cil) and paper tabletop roleplaying game. This means players have a lot of rules (and math) to remember while playing, which can be overwhelming to new and old players alike. Tools like D&D Beyond help make the game more interactive and beginner-friendly, which allows the playerbase to continue to grow.

Through this project, I hope to show how important and effective it is to incorporate new, interactive technology into what is viewed, generally, as a hobby done only with pencils, paper, some dice, and a lot of imagination.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D%26D_Beyond
https://www.dndbeyond.com/

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Submitted by natalyv on Thu, 01/16/2020 - 07:11

William Blake is an eighteenth-century poet and artist who created engravings and artwork to correspond with his vast creations of literature. The William Blake Archive catalogs the varying versions of Blake's work, whether it be differences in color scheme or the tone conveyed through the image, in addition to including his works of poetry and descriptions of his creations and background information.

I am not completely sure of the goal I have in my research with the archive, but one aspect I would like to investigate is the benefit of the archive, and creations similar to it, on the humanities and those who partake in the field, as well as the process of including Blake's work on a digital platform as many of his art was engravings.

http://www.blakearchive.org

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