Well, it’s been awhile since I last wrote at the end of the Doing Digital History workshop (thanks CHNM & NEH!). I am three weeks into my Digital History course, so time to reflect a bit. I think it is going fairly well. We had a discussion yesterday about how we would define digital history, after reading Rosenzweig & Cohen, as well as some of the digital humanities definition pieces. I have managed to use PressForward to feed the students’ blogs into our course site (yay!).
Next week we have a session on Omeka and Dublin Core. We also have coming up: a presentation on a project mapping the Underground Railroad in Chautauqua County. This presentation will be by Nick Gunner, mapper extraordinaire, who mapped the materials Wendy Straight and Doug Shepard compiled on anti-slavery activism in the county. Next, we get to see how Cindy Yochym at Fredonia’s Reed Library digitized the Anna Clift Smith journal.
Soon the students will be choosing their group project from two options. First is the story of Sarah Sinfield, a local woman who asked for and received a pension from Congress for her Civil War service, after accompanying her husband and his regiment to various battles, including Gettysburg. The second project is recovering and mapping the buildings of “lost Dunkirk”–lost to urban renewal, railroad changes, and economic transformation.
The course continues to challenge both me and the students, but I am pleased so far with how it is going. And I know it is far, far better than it would have been had I not been privileged to attend the CHNM/NEH Digital History Seminar this summer. If you’d like to check out my digital history course, please do so at HIST 396 I Dig History.
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