Category: Uncategorized

“Mitakuyepi! Welcome!” Bdote Memory Map. http://bdotememorymap.org/.

The Bdote Memory Map started out as a local history project on a wall of the Ancient Traders Gallery in Minneapolis.  The gallery is a community center for the Dakota people in the area.  The visitors who toured the gallery participated in the collection of the community history by writing their memories of Dakota sites on the wall.  The wall featured a map of the Minneapolis-St. Paul area and was marked with important Dakota sites.  It displayed the sites with their Dakota names and allowed people to connect with those places.  Eventually the memories found a new home as they became digitized and turned into the bdote memory map.  The website is a continuation of the map on the gallery wall, plus the addition of educational tools and a telling of Dakota history. 

The website presents itself extremely well.  It is eye-catching and reflects the Dakota culture in many facets.  The main page has a menu that allows visitors to navigate the site.  A tab at the bottom of the page provides users with some background information about the Dakota.  It did not take me long to learn why this site was called the “bdote” memory map.  Clicking on the bottom of the circle takes the user to a video where a video shows a greeting in the Dakota tradition.  A click to the right side of the circle and the user finds a video that explains the Dakota place in the world as “Urban Tribesmen.”  The short video explains how the city is their home even after losing the land their ancestors lived on for hundreds of years.   Clicking on the top of the circle takes the visitor to the memory map.  It contains places around the Minneapolis-St. Paul area that are important to the Dakota tribe.  When the user clicks on the site, they choose a list of videos about specific spots.  Many of the videos are oral histories by people who witnessed the history that unfolded at those places.  The left side of the circle provides a link to a brief history of the Dakota people in the area.  It also explains the importance of being connected to a place.  Tabs at the top of the page provide a Dakota glossary with words read by the Dakota people themselves.  There are also lesson plans for teachers to help them teach about the Dakota tribe.

I found this website to be a great resource, it contains great primary sources and the information is easy to access.   The first thing that I noticed was that this website encompasses everything that public history is.   It is a community history, written by the community, for the education of the community and the public in general.  It provides insight into the history of the Dakota people in the twin cities area of Minnesota.  It allows community members to participate by adding their voices to the record and it allows young Dakotas to learn their history and traditions from their tribe members.  This well-designed site is very user-friendly.  It is a great place to learn more about the Dakota people for anyone who is interested in learning about them.  This site would be especially useful to anyone doing research on the Dakota people.  The oral histories are especially valuable for the stories that they record about the people and their experiences. Go and see for yourself, if nothing more than to discover why it is called the bdote memory map.

EDSITEment is a content provider of detailed lesson plans. Provided by accredited and financially sponsored academics for public use and evaluation, the quality of content is generally high. Content providers are, for the most part, professional educators, and most of these lesson plans are intended for secondary and higher education level courses. Overall, the sheer quantity of lesson plans is quite impressive. In general, they offer quality content that is backed by legitimate source material. However, upon reviewing dozens of these lesson plans, I’ve determined there is no adequate metric for determining the quality of each lesson plan.

It would appear that the administrators of EDSITEment simply sponsor certain educators with adequate qualifications to provide content. Rather than evaluate the quality of each individual lesson plan, EDSITEment places trust in their chosen content providers to provide quality content. The result is a great disparity between the quality of any two lesson plans.

The danger of this lack of regulation is that those who may be less qualified or ill-informed on a particular historical subject may take the content of a lesson plan at face value. Educators who wish to use these lesson plans should critique the overall quality of the lesson plan and determine whether the material presented is relevant to their classes’ curricula. If these vital steps are not undertaken, the result is that some of the less fulfilling, less substantiated or blatantly inaccurate lesson plans (there are some of these present,) may be adopted in the classroom. This is largely due to the unrestricted guidelines of EDSITEment’s content, which is both of benefit and detriment to the platform. The benefit of deregulation of content is that there is simply more content available, but the detriment is that much of this content is not adequately vetted by qualified individuals. The best way to understand the discrepancy in quality between lesson plans is to walk through the process of creating one.

The first section of an EDSITEment lesson plan is the topic or ‘guiding question’ that provides focus for the content provided. Some EDSITEment content providers use this section well, with specific questions that truly delve into the material and may invoke relevant questions in the intended audience. Other lesson plans I’ve seen have very weak guiding questions that don’t inspire the audience to make inquiries and simply digest information without thinking critically about the content. Fortunately, the aforementioned lack of regulation makes the less valuable lesson plans identifiable, as the weaker lesson plans often have uninspired guiding questions.

In my opinion, the section that truly determines a successful EDSITEment lesson plan is the ‘learning outcomes’ section. Here, the ideas voiced in the guiding questions segment are more fully developed, and the process of achieving the goal of the lesson is described. EDSITEment content creators often support their initial claims about the material with evidence in this section, and some of the more developed lesson plans have many learning outcomes with a number of sources that substantiate their claims about the topic. This section is the heart of the lesson plan, and it is solely up to the content provider to create a well-rounded outcomes section in order to successfully pitch the use of the lesson plan to their intended audience.

Aside from these two sections, there are several other segments that content providers can dedicate to providing extra resources relevant to the lesson plan. The best lesson plans I’ve seen use these sections liberally, and some have dozens of primary source documents and media varieties attached to the lesson plan for those who are interested in the topic and wish to explore it further.

In summation, EDSITEment is a great, albeit simple, digital platform that enables users to share their lesson plans and gathered materials with a wider audience of academics and educators. The lack of regulation ensures that there is a steady stream of new content coming in, but also leaves the responsibility of vetting the material to the individuals that access the website. As a primarily text based platform, there aren’t any multimedia features of note to speak of, but this simple platform is a step in the right direction. EDSITEment is emblematic of an increasing democratization of knowledge and a greater level of collaboration between educators between institutions and across disciplines.

For more information about EDSITEment, please visit their website:
https://edsitement.neh.gov/

Omeka is a self-described “web publishing platform for sharing digital collections and creating media-rich online exhibits.” When considering this mission, Omeka’s developers make it clear that Omeka is a platform intended for academics and professionals, and not for casual use. Omeka’s statement of purpose also suggests the amount of detail that is customary of most of its exhibits. When creating an online collection, a great deal of time is necessary to gather valuable metadata on exhibit items. This again nods to the point that Omeka is intended for the detail oriented academic or professional.

The website is fully functional and everything works as intended. Visitors have the option to download the Omeka application for further ease of use and for some features that are not included on the browser platform, such as tool integration with academic software like Zotero. There are three versions of Omeka: Omeka S, Omeka Classic and Omeka Browser. When deciding which of the three a user wishes to use, there are visual representations of what they may expect with that model of Omeka. There are also integrated web pages for those who are curious to learn more about each model of Omeka. The Omeka landing page does not overwhelm visitors with too much information but allows for clear navigation to more information if they so choose.

Once a visitor chooses which version of Omeka to use, they will find that the platform allows users to tailor their exhibit to their own needs, abilities and volume of material. Integral to the Omeka platform is the Dublin Core, which is a valuable tool for entering and managing metadata related to an exhibit. There are fields for virtually any kind of metadata one could imagine, but users are not forced to fill out data that isn’t pertinent to their exhibit. In other words, the options are there, but aren’t mandatory to complete.

There are also numerous customization options for an Omeka page. One can tailor the look and format of their Omeka page to their own needs and preferences, much like a personal website. This is key to presenting a collection in a pleasing way to the creator’s audience.

Overall, Omeka is presented in a very professional manner and allows its users to create professional looking exhibits on a digital platform. The ability to customize an exhibit and have built in options to determine the amount of metadata one wants to include in an exhibit allows for both flexibility and professional quality work. Omeka is ideal for those who want to include visualization materials to their research while maintaining a professional looking exhibit that isn’t dominated by large blocks of text.

For more information on Omeka, please visit their website:
https://omeka.org/

StoryMaps is a digital tool that provides the resources to create a narrative using customizable digital maps. StoryMaps is part of the ArcGIS platform, a digital tool that is quickly growing in popularity, largely due to its unique format and great amount of customization options. The best way to evaluate the effectiveness of StoryMaps is to go through the process of creating one of these map-based narratives.

StoryMaps is solely reliant on the ability of its audience to see detailed maps clearly, as that is the primary benefit derived by using the ArcGIS platform. ArcGIS powered mapping tools form the basis of StoryMaps, and their quality is exceptional. There are a wide variety of maps available for use. Some maps highlight the actual street conditions on the ground. Others focus on specific geographical features such as mountains and rivers. There are even highly detailed maps taken from the United States Geographical Survey. These are the only maps that require knowledge of sophisticated cartographic elements. Aside from an ability to understand some of the more complex and obscure maps, the rest of the website’s features are all quite intuitive and require minimal technical ability. However, the ArcGIS platform is exclusively meant for sighted users. The only accommodations made for non-sighted users are the availability of alternate text sections that can provide an audio-based description of photographs and other forms of embedded media content.

StoryMaps is ideal for telling stories that take place across great distances, but can be useful for both regional and local stories as well. The diverse collection of maps and ability to display maps from a global to street level perspective is invaluable contextual information. There are numerous customization options available to lend even more information to the default maps. These options allow users to indicate the movement of people across time and space, highlight areas of interest and label locations with other valuable information.

Other than the maps, there is a significant amount of space on any individual StoryMap dedicated to text. This section includes all the most common and useful content additions and rich text editors that are available. Users can embed links to different types of media content, which when clicked will appear within the StoryMap itself in an area known as the ‘main stage.’ Other methods of embedding content are available when first organizing the StoryMap. Overall, the amount of media one can effectively package within an individual StoryMap is staggering.

There really is no limitation on who can and who should use StoryMaps, but those who would derive the most benefit from the platform would likely be those involved in the humanities, such as historians, political scientists, sociologist and any kind of cultural studies enthusiast. While not overly complicated, the use of the ArcGIS platform encourages extreme attention to detail, and therefore a patient and discerning outlook. It also encourages users who have a passion for the content they are providing. This in turn can inspire visitors to undertake similar projects based upon their own interests. StoryMaps is easy to learn and hard to master. At the most basic level, it is a great platform to tell a story through maps and different varieties of media content, and at its most sophisticated level, it can provide a platform for historians to provide deep contextual knowledge of a subject through a combination of academic research, mapping tools and media content.

For more information on StoryMaps, please visit:
https://storymaps.arcgis.com/en/

To see a fully developed StoryMap that I created:
https://arcg.is/1O9KK4

My name is Norbert Geremy Landin but I tend to go by Geremy. I love photography and more specifically, I love photographing cultural events that encompass Latin-American life, love, and opportunity. Preservation of a culture that could truly never be lost is the reason why I do what I do and hope to continue to do as my life unfolds.

Warren, Christopher, Daniel Shore, Jessica Otis, Scott Weingart, and John Ladd. Six Degrees of Francis Bacon. Accessed February 23, 2019. http://www.sixdegreesoffrancisbacon.com.

The website Six Degrees of Francis Bacon an attempt to link the English philosopher and public official Francis Bacon to his contemporaries, who lived during the Elizabethan era. Bacon sits in the center of what is a visual who’s who of the period. Names range from important to the lesser-known. This site is a great starting point for research on the era, and it is a great example of what crowd sourcing can do as the public contributes data for the site. The visual connections could aid a researcher in noticing a relationship they may have missed. The public has the ability to add new people to the web and expand the connections of the people already there.

While Queen Elizabeth would seem to be the obvious choice for a project like this, Francis Bacon is an excellent choice. Not only is it a parody of the Six Degrees of Keven Bacon game, but Sir Bacon had many spheres of influence during his life. He was a philosopher, scientist, and he served as Queen Elizabeth’s Lord High Chancellor. This gives him contacts with many types of people during his life who operated in many different spheres.

The website is easy to use, and after interacting with it for a bit of time it becomes easier to understand. A tutorial takes you through all the site’s features in a few minutes for those who would like a systematic guide. The data is displayed as a three-dimensional web that can be manipulated by clicking and dragging . Sir Bacon sits in the middle and different strands connect him to various people of the time. Although the site bears his name, researchers can make any name the focus of a smaller web with just a click. Although the name does mention six degrees this is somewhat misleading as only two levels of connections are available. Another feature is the ability to view groups of people. For instance, the researcher can click on one of the metadata boxes at the bottom of the page and call up all the philosophers in the web. There are almost 75 categories to activate. When viewing a person’s web, the boxes at the bottom light up to signal that members of those professions are present. To meet the needs of researchers who require more information about the people in the web, a box to the left provides links to three different research sites where more information is available.

The audience for this website may vary greatly. The connection to six degrees of Keven Bacon may attract casual web surfers. They may not stay for long though because the site is limited for that use. Researchers of the Elizabethan Age of England will get the most out of this site. Being able to see connections or looking for new relationships is what this site does best. Causal history buffs might get something out of this site too. They would be the target audience if the connections ran deeper. It is feasible that a casual history buff could spend hours seeing who claims a connection to Francis Bacon and wind up exploring those connections for hours. Maybe they will expand the Bacon web in the future.

The website makes for an interesting research tool. Both researchers and casual users would be able to get something out of a visit to this site. The lack of depth is a bit disappointing. The two levels of connections are a limit to both research and fun, but again, maybe the future will allow for expansion into a site worthy of its name.

Nevada Test Site: Oral History Project. Unlv. Southern Nevada: The Boomtown Years Mining. Accessed February 25, 2019. http://digital.library.unlv.edu/ntsohp/.

This website is a collection of stories about the nuclear testing that was done in the Nevada desert north of Las Vegas. Over 1000 nuclear detonations were initiated at the test site between its opening in 1951 and 1992 when the United States finally ended nuclear weapons testing. The website has collected 335 hours of recordings from many different people connected to the site both directly and indirectly. There are stories told by people who were in the military that were in charge of operations at the site.  Contributions from physicists, other scientists, and engineers who worked on developing and building the nuclear devices that were being tested and the experiments that recorded data about their effectiveness. There are even stories from people who tried promoting peace by protesting the activities taking place at the test site. Native Americans lend their voices also to tell the story of how the desert is a sacred place to their tribes. 

The home page is well organized and easy to navigate.  There are links below the header that will take researchers to a timeline, the collection of stories, or maps of the relevant areas.  The timeline covers the entire Manhattan Project and it designates what events took place at the Nevada Test Site.  Clicking on an event on the timeline will take the researcher to interviews that talk about that time.  This is a very convenient search feature.  Going to the link Community of Voices gives the researcher access to all the interviews that the site has collected.  There is a search feature but no explanation on the metadata.  The search can be done by person or key word or phrase. 

The interviews are all recorded video.  The people telling their stories can be seen talking and giving their recount of events.  There are a wide range of perspectives to choose from.  The military people and scientists who were working inside the test site give researchers a feel for their work and conditions, while protesters and peace activists tell the tales of how they tried to stop the experiments that were designed to build bigger and better weapons.  The Natives American recount how the land is sacred to them and how this military base has affected their people by cutting them off from the land of their ancestors.  The stories go beyond the Manhattan project and the Cold War.  They talk about how lives were changed by the work done at the test site. 

This is a great website to use for research on the Cold War.  The ability to search by event, date, or key word is extremely useful.  This would be a great start to uncover primary accounts of the development of the American nuclear program.  It is also very helpful if doing Native American studies or research on the peace movement that went on during the Cold War.  The stories are easy to access and they are well documented.  This would be a useful site to even the casual user who just wanted to learn more about the era. 

Reverend Willie Ford, Jr. http://digitalassets.lib.berkeley.edu/roho/ucb/text/ford_willie.pdf. Regional Oral History Office, The National Park Service, and the City of Richmond, California. Interviews Conducted by Nadine Wilmot, 2006. Reviewed by Gabriel Cohen on February 28, 2019.

Presentation

The website is very simple, which has both potential advantages and disadvantages depending on the audience. The simplicity of the site is undoubtedly useful for those who are unfamiliar with oral history depositories or archived materials. This same simplicity makes navigation quite cumbersome for those who are utilizing the website for research; one has to scroll through dozens of oral histories to find one relevant to what they are researching.

Another obstacle created by the simplicity of the website is the complete lack of metadata. When scrolling through these oral histories, the only metadata presented is the name of the subject of the interview, and the date the interview was conducted. There is a brief synopsis of the interview itself and a very small amount of biographical information provided about the subject. However, if one is looking for specific terms or dates, a heavy reliance on the search feature included in their browser is necessary. Even when conducting these rudimentary searches, there is a great deal of content covered in the interviews that is not touched upon in the synopses on the main page.

After selecting the oral history of Reverend Willie Ford, Jr., I was directed to a transcript of the oral history. Aside from the legal information included, the first information presented in this oral history is a table of contents, which breaks the interview into two distinct sections. This is a useful resource, as the oral history is quite long. However, there are no timestamps attached to the table of contents, which I believe would be of great benefit for a researcher who is interested in a specific type of content.

The main body of text that composes the oral history does have timestamps associated with each part of the dialogue. The interviewer was very thorough with the transcription, which is clear from the mistakes made, such as the poor placement of recording equipment that the interviewer Nadine Wilmot mentions during the interview.

Content

The interview is well organized, and Wilmot was very detail oriented in thorough in capturing Ford’s story. In the first section of the interview, Ford discusses his early life and his family. When Ford began to accelerate the narrative too much, and bypass critical information such as his mother’s occupation and lifestyle, Wilmot very directly yet politely asked him to slow down so that none of these critical pieces of the narrative would be overlooked. Ford seemed quite comfortable with the conversational style Wilmot adopted during the interview, and Wilmot had only to ask very short and concise questions to prompt the narrative to continue. Wilmot’s questions prompted Ford to discuss very sensitive subjects like slavery and segregation, but were put forward with very gentle and unassuming language.

Wilmot’s direct approach did have some drawbacks though. There are a number of instances where Ford was about to touch on an important subject, but Wilmot derailed the conversation to discuss something else. I noted that each time this happened, Ford circled the conversation back around to finish the portion he began previously. The result of this was that the chronology of Ford’s life was presented somewhat out of order at times. In the case of having a very personable and open interviewee, I believe prompting responses in such short intervals detracts from the narrative as a whole. At times, Wilmot ceased to ask questions and let Ford speak continuously for several minutes. This section was the most emotionally revealing portion of the interview. Overall though, Wilmot did a brilliant job making Ford feel comfortable during the interview, even when addressing difficult subjects involving race relations in America in the early 20th century, which is no easy task.