The Rocky 'Knol'

When I was an undergrad, my professors strictly forbade us to use such “unreliable” and “nonacademic” sources such as Google and Wikipedia. We were to only use academically reliable secondary and primary sources such as the library and archives; the only digital resources allowed were such databases as JSTOR (online storage for academic journals). But as they say, the world is changing. Google has now announced that they will be venturing further into academic credibility. Their first foray was their beta Google Scholar, a search engine that brings up articles, books, etc. that relate to particular search words. Now they are launching a campaign that ousts Wikipedia, the online encyclopedia, which anyone can edit/add to, by upping the ante to only accepting submissions by accredited specialists of each particular topic.
According to a BBC news article, Google has started to invite authors to write about their respected specialities on a new site that will be called ‘Knol.’ Since Google is the leader in Internet ranking, the Knol site will be the first hit on any subject that is searched and that finds a match in their encyclopedic site (which says something else about who controls the information on the Internet). Google offers this site as an open invitation to find out more about their brain child and gives people a chance to offer their opinions on it:
"KnolStuff.com is a brand new social networking community for Google's Open Encyclopedia. This is not Google's site but a Community to discuss and learn about "Knol" and take advantage of what Google is soon offering."

So what does this imply for the academic world? What will be considered a "reliable" source? Many post-structuralist profs already encourage their students to question what makes a source reliable or unreliable and what it means to be an "expert." What kind of screening process will Google have to consider? Wikipedia took a very casual attitude towards the information placed on their site as it is intended to be a public forum for anyone's opinion or view on a particular topic. Google might have a rocky road ahead to prove their validity as an academic resource. However, I think this is an excellent step in the organisation of the abundance of information that is available and provides an excellent venue for professionals to bring their expertise on a particular subject to a wider audience.

Week 12 Assignment

Alan Cooper wrote an article called "Your Program's Posture" that classified software programs into four main categories based on how they interact with the user: sovereign, transient, daemonic and parasitic. Our assignment this week for our Digital History class is to "make a list of all of the software that you interact with during a typical historical research process and classify it according to Cooper’s scheme."
I am not a computer person, so the programs I use to write a research paper are pretty standard. I use a library catalogue to search for books and the electronic journal storage, such as JSTOR, and electronic finding aids for archival sources to search for primary and secondary sources. None of these quite fit into Cooper's categories, although the recently discovered Zotero program might be considered a "transient" program as it is a tool that appears at the bottom of the screen and can disappear again when you no longer need it. I use Microsoft Word to write my paper or Microsoft PowerPoint to create a presentation of my research, both of which I believe would be considered sovereign programs as both dominate the page and are continuously used. I can not think of parasitic or daemonic programs that are running that I am aware of, though as I said, I know very little about what happens 'behind the scenes' as it were.

Software usability issues enter into the historians craft when they are trying to communicate that history to the public in digital form. Most people are able to use programs such as Word to hand in a research paper. Less people know how to programme a website to display the results of that research. What could be improved, if digital is (as it seems to be) the way of the future, is to create "humanities-friendly" programs. There are templates and easy, helpful guides to programs like PowerPoint, why can there not be more formulated programs for the not-so-computer-savvy historian? I recognize the importance of developing newer, faster, more interesting programs, but I also think that more time needs to be spent developing programs for ease of use, so that there are more sovereign programs available for humanity-type research to be displayed on the internet.

People's History

The focus of our Public History Masters program is basically how to bring academic history to the public. This means learning about the different theories and approaches to history in public forums such as museums, archives, and historic centres. This is learning about history and then taking it a step further and communicating it. Historical facts are less important than the ways in which history communicates, which is somewhat counter-intuitive to traditional academic historians. We have noticed in the program that very few people, including others in the history field, know what public history is even though the work of it surrounds people everyday. Treena Hein's article, "History for the people" in November's University Affairs magazine remarks on the new shift in attention public history is receiving as a valid and necessary component of historical education. What history is being told is the central question historians, curators, archivists, and historical interpreters need to be asking themselves. This article describes an important process in the recognition of the need for such programs as public history that takes academia and makes it applicable and useful by bringing it to the public. It is essential for people to have access to their history. By keeping it locked up in the ivory tower, history becomes self-serving and known to only a few.

Reclaiming Cymraeg

Language is a powerful force in cultural history. It is the voice that speaks to the future, and when that language is suppressed, so is the story of the past. Legends surrounding the figure of King Arthur have been retold for 1500 years in hundreds of languages around the world. His legend dominates late Celtic poetry, and he has played an integral role in Welsh cultural identity. Medieval Welsh poets were not that far removed from the druids who maintained the memories of the tribe. The intricacies of the language of the poems were not just artistic statements; they also acted as the history and memory of the Welsh people.

The Act of Union in 1536 by Henry VIII was the start of the Anglicization of Welsh language and culture, robbing a people of their past. This made it no longer acceptable to associate with their heritage. With the suppression of their language, they lost an integral part of their cultural identity.

The Celtic revival of the 20th century saw a slow reclamation of the Welsh language (Cymraeg) and now the country is legally bilingual. The survival of the Arthurian legends show that the Welsh wished to retain much of their cultural spirit and heritage despite an early suppression of their language. The Welsh are still struggling with the ramifications of so much cultural loss. Some stories will be lost forever; but by reclaiming their language, they can take back the power to control their own history and re-appropriate the poetic legends that were so definitive in their past.

Let's Get Digital, Digital

When the world starts to get too confusing, we often turn back for a nostalgic look at the past. For me, it was a return to the eternal wisdom of Olivia Newton-John. She cries out: "Let's get physical, physical. I wanna get physical, let's get into physical." While this motto has been successful for millions of years (or at least the 1980s), it is certainly not the slogan of our post-Y2K generation. It is no longer about getting physical, but about getting digital! The conflicting approaches, the intellectual battles, the death-cries of Luddites, we are all at the mercy of technology. Com'on! Everybody is doing it...

And we are. Just as we waved sadly goodbye to the Beta videotape player (despite their better quality) and on to the VHS, so are we now thrust by market forces greater than ourselves into purchasing the "latest" in digital technology. Every time there is a substantial technological "improvement" (and I say that heavy with irony), we are at their mercy. Eventually they stop making beta tapes, VHS, etc., so that we are forced to buy a whole new system in order to participate. In short, we become consumerized victims of technology. I could download Olivia right now without ever having bought a vinyl, a tape, or a CD; however, I will have had to buy a computer. With digital cable, we no longer need VHS, DVD or the employees of Blockbuster, to watch a movie; but, we do need to buy a modem. And I don't even need to get out of my chair and have any human contact whatsoever to do any of these things.

So who or what, in fact, do we need?

What we still need, and as far as I can tell will always need, are the teachers. To know what literature is we need the English teachers and professors; to know about technology we need the science classes (and yes, even Digital History); and to know our past we need to know our History. As public historians, we are all hoping to enter a field based upon the idea of bringing history with all of its educational baggage to the people. Raise your textbooks loud and proud.

But, we spend so much time theorizing about what history is and how to present it, that I wonder what answers are being provided. Tribal historians, the bards and community leaders, knew how to remember and present the history that was important for the tribe. Every generation passed down the stories and traditions to their apprentices and successors. There was a conclusion, an answer to the questions, that ensured the survival of their people both physically, and through the stories. Today, we are so bogged down in the theory of history that we have no straight answer to the questions history raises. Historians should be bards, but instead we are politicians.

The big bonus of the Internet and digital images of collections is having all that knowledge accessible and available for use to a wider range of people. And that is a wonderful thing. But we forget that the Internet is a tool. Not the teacher. We need the teacher, the leader, to show us what to do with this information. It is not that we need our hand held, we all crawled out of the swamp equally, but I think that living in the age of abundant information does not mean we live in an age of abundant knowledge.

We may have left the simple wisdom of Olivia Newton-John in the blurry decade of the 80s, but her message need not be forgotten. Sometimes, it's as simple as getting a little physical. I am all for the digital availability of the Internet, but as consumers - of products and of knowledge - we won't be able to keep up with the constant changes without our teachers. Change is sometimes forced upon us - such as when we have to buy a DVD player because VHS tapes aren't made any more - but, if we have been taught well, we will know what to do about it. The "getting digital" ship may have sailed, but hopefully those manning its direction took some swimming lessons.

Museum Exhibit Review: Ontario Museum of Archaeology

Museum of Ontario Archaeology
1600 Atttawandaron Road
London, Ontario
Canada N6G 3M6

The Gathering of Good Minds and Native Harvest Festival presents
‘A Celebration of First Nations Arts, Wisdom and Culture’ September 21-23, 2007.
Reviewed September 22 and 23, 2007


Main Gallery is a permanent exhibit. Temporary Gallery September 23, 2007-March 23, 2008. Lawson Village is an ongoing excavation with reconstructions beginning in July, 2007. Museum is open May-December 10-430 (Sept. to Dec. closed M & T). January-April 1-4 Sa. & Su. only. Family $10, Adults: $4, Seniors/Students: $3.25, Children 5 to 12: $2, Preschoolers and Sponsors Free. Village site open May to Nov. (Weather Permitting). Executive Director, Dr. Robert Pearce.

Internet description of museum, virtual tour, education resources, membership and employment information, the museum gift shop, and the Neutral Iroquoian Village, http://www.uwo.ca/museum/index.html


The Museum of Ontario Archaeology is located in London, Ontario, and was originally founded in 1933 by Amos and Wilfred Jury. It has been affiliated with the University of Western Ontario as a research facility and educational resource since 1927. The 500-year-old Neutral Iroquoian village was discovered in the 19th century, and the land was donated by Tom and Miggsie Lawson for the construction of a new museum and archaeological exploration. The museum’s current location beside the village was built in 1980, after it was discovered that the area was a 4,000-year-old campsite. Their directive is the research, education, archaeology, and collection of local Ontario history and Aboriginal pre-history.

On a beautiful, sunny weekend in late September, the museum hosted ‘A Celebration of First Nations Arts, Wisdom and Culture’ organised by The Gathering of Good Minds and Native Harvest Festival. The festival was supported by such institutions as the Ontario Arts Council, The University of Western Ontario, and the National Aboriginal Achievement Foundation. The celebration was outside the museum in the recently unveiled Lawson Iroquoian Village, which is an on-going archaeological excavation and reconstruction of a pre-historic Neutral Iroquoian village, the only one of its kind in Canada. The village is divided from the museum by a reconstructed wooden palisade and efforts were made to make it as “real” as possible. The effect certainly gives the enclosure a sense of “authenticity” and adds to the character of the museum. Within the palisade were several interactive activities and performances. There was a reconstructed longhouse, tipi, canoe, snowshoes, and drums—all of which were hand-made and based on archaeological evidence. The site was attended by local Natives ready and happy to explain the significance of the items, how they were built, and tell fascinating tales from their past or the lives of their ancestors. The interactive activities were mostly intended for children and families, but were interesting enough to capture the attention of any age. They had crafts, archaeological excavations, and song and dance lessons. This was an excellent effort by the museum to get people involved in history.

The museum displays its permanent exhibition in the main gallery, just off of the gift shop entrance. The exhibit was designed to reflect Ontario’s archaeological history, focusing largely on the Native peoples who have occupied the area for the past 5,000 years. According to the staff, the artefacts and displays are arranged chronologically from prehistoric times to the 20th century. There were many interesting artefacts, and a plethora of spearheads almost to excess, but the displays lacked labels and rarely had dates. It is a rather small room, and the displays were haphazard and dusty, making any arrangement difficult to follow. Granted, the main gallery is under renovation for some new permanent displays that will be placed near the entrance, but it is unfortunate that they did not take the time to dust off the displays and fix the broken shelving that had artefacts dangling from them in a most precarious manner.

At the back of the room there was an interesting miniature display showing the arrival of the ‘Black Robes’ to a typical 16th century Native village with a telephone through which you can listen to a dialog about Native life, subsistence, practices, and culture. The dialog was informative; however, it was presented in a rather dull and monotonous voice and the display was outmoded. It was quite dark in the gallery and there was nothing to try and engage the viewer to understand the implications of the myriad of artefacts—quite the contrast to the interactive focus of the outdoor exhibit. The virtual museum on the website for the exhibit provides a more in-depth look into Native lives during different time periods; it is unfortunate that they do not make the same wealth of information available in the museum itself.

In the centre of the room was a large textual panel dedicated to the two armed merchant schooners found on the bottom of Lake Ontario—the Hamilton and the Scourge—from the War of 1812, but there were no artefacts displayed from the discovery. There was also a small room dedicated to the founders of the museum, the Jury family, and their personal collections, but it was closed to viewers. These two displays lacked any identifying visual connection to the overall theme of “Aboriginal culture” and were the only testament to European culture in the local history. They looked awkward and very out of place.

The Temporary Gallery at the back of the building continued the Aboriginal theme of the museum and had a beautiful display featuring three Native artists—Zoey Wood, R. Gary Miller, and Gordon Miller. This room was more like a professional art gallery as the layout had an aesthetically pleasing and symmetrical pattern. The museum chose an excellent combination of artists, each with very unique styles, but all used bright, powerful colours that complimented each other nicely. The lighting was effective, and focused on the paintings on each wall, giving them a gentle glow, while keeping the centre of the room dimmer. The paintings were an excellent conclusion to round off the Native cultural experience; however, because it was so nice, it made the main gallery even drabber in comparison.

The Museum of Ontario Archaeology has many qualities to recommend it—the Village especially was successful in engaging visitors with history. There was more to learn about Aboriginal culture from the one Native woman telling the story of the gathering of the Sweetgrass than all of the indoor displays. The main gallery may not have appeared so vapid had it not been for the fact that there was a bright, fun, engaging, outdoor display. However, the overall effectiveness of the museum to communicate some aspects of Aboriginal history was successful because the culture the artefacts functioned within was recreated in the various exhibits and displays. The three exhibits together provided a more holistic cultural context to the traditional museum by demonstrating how Aboriginal culture, art, and artefacts all came together to form the local history of Ontario.

The Language of Computer Jargon

The language of computer jargon is single-handedly the most terrifying aspect of learning about computers. Language is such a fundamental aspect to the humanities that we become quite lost and bewildered when there is suddenly a text that we can not decifer. Ferdinand de Saussure describes language as a series of signs that are assigned meaning through culture. Every sign is a union of a signifier (word) and a signified (meaning).
We know that DOG= because we have been trained to recognise its signification as a cute little furry creature. But when I see things like programming code, I see: "*%@#???" We are lost in the proverbial woods being hunted by the mythical ones and zeros. I do not have the language to understand the signifiers.

As I work through W3C's School tutorial on CSS, I realise that this process of signification is still ongoing. That I actually understand some of the terms and can assign them meaning. Having also worked through the RSS tutorial and the HTML tutorial, I am beginning to recognise signs and knowing what they mean. The W3C Schools do an excellent job of de-mystifying some basic computer knowledge. When I think of it, when I first looked at Latin I thought, "*%#????" so it is perfectly normal not to understand what all this computer jargon means and for it to look like something from another planet. This is not an easy process. For example, I tried to make this page a different colour using CSS, and it didn't work. I don't know why it didn't work, and I don't know how to make it work. But I do know that CSS means applying a particular style to HTML to make it look a certain way on the page, which requires somehow linking a "style sheet". Eventually, (I think, I hope) I will figure out how to apply this as I start to grasp more of the lingo.

I think what makes some of the readings so difficult and so intimidating is that they are often scripted in a language that I do not understand, referencing programs and technologies that I am not familiar with. The more I read, obviously, the more versed I shall become in what they are trying to say. I am going to look at it from now on as learning a new language. And while I shall never master computer jargonian, I am hoping to start recognising some of its signifiers and understanding what it is signifying.

Website Review: Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump

Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump, http://www.head-smashed-in.com/. Created and maintained by the Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump Interpretive Centre, Fort Macleod, Alberta. Reviewed September 27-30, 2007.

Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump is an UNESCO World Heritage Site located in Southern Alberta that has been continuously used by Aboriginal peoples for over five thousand years. It is also an ongoing archaeological site and home to the Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump Interpretive Centre. The website as a whole includes information on Blackfoot heritage, archaeology of the site, and the ways people can participate in history through the Interpretive Centre, tipi camping, and educational programs.

The website is well organised with a broad range of engaging topics centred on Aboriginal history and archaeology. An interesting part of the site is the “Blackfoot History” page, which provides broad definitions of the history of the area and its peoples. This part of the site is useful and covers many aspects of Blackfoot life; however, it could be further developed as the information is brief and quite simplistic. The website also provides an interesting look into the archaeological work and research done around the site. The link to “Archaeological Facts” introduces the reader to the purposes and aims of archaeology and the story it has revealed about Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump, its surrounding area, and the people who used to live there. Through the link “Buffalo Tracks,” a fifteen-page archaeological booklet in PDF provides a more in-depth look into the history and ethnography of the buffalo culture. There is also a link to a permanent exhibition at the Centre called “Lost Identities,” which is an ongoing project to name the people and places of thousands of Aboriginal photographs from the Provincial Archives of Alberta. While this is an important reflection of the role of the Centre as a museum and interactive historic site, an online exhibit of the project would have enabled more people to benefit from the findings.

The links are easy to navigate and remain on the left-hand side of the page no matter which page you follow, making it easy to change direction and go to different parts of the site. The “Links” page has an excellent collection of websites broken down by subject that leads to further information about everything from Alberta Tourism, to Native history, to its associated supporters. The connections are clearly labelled and all of the linked websites are active and well-maintained. At the bottom of the homepage, unfortunately, is another copy of the set of links to other historic sites around Southern Alberta. Only one of the links, the “Remington Carriage Museum,” leads to its own site; of the others, two lead to Head-Smashed-In’s own homepage, while the remainder do not link to their own websites.

The style of the website is appealing as the graphics are simple and not too busy, with a uniform background that makes the pages clear and comprehensive. The website uses popular programs, like PDF and Java, which are user-friendly and which most computers are able to run. The resources are largely textual, so while the pages are informative, and the visitor can learn all about Head-Smashed-In and its history, there is not a lot of interactivity on the website itself, but rather it advertises what activities there are available to do on the actual site.

The audience focus is quite broad, as the aim is to attract people to Alberta by getting them interested in both Aboriginal and regional history. The use of simple links, programs, and language makes it intelligible to a wide-range of people. It is not focused towards academia, but it does have many educational aspects. The link to “Educational Programs” opens a PDF document that describes the interactive activities they have available for students from kindergarten to grade twelve, which are designed to follow the latest Alberta Education Social Studies Curriculum. There is also information about the “Sunday Learning Series,” which anyone can participate in. While the page may have limited scholarly interest, it is an excellent source to get the general public and education system interested, engaged, and participating in history.

"Collecting Experiences" Exercise

The assignment is to write a proposal for a project that would collect peoples' memories similar to the websites created by researchers at the Centre for History and New Media , such as the Memory Archive and the Hurricane Katrina website. All of them are dedicated to collecting the personal stories of particular events, places, or activities.

Just for fun, and to see if I can do it, I am writing all of this in HTML.

As I have a personal interest in oral cultures, I would suggest creating a website for the collection of Aboriginal myths, legends, personal stories, all in the language of their people. There are several archives all around the world that have contained within their vaults, recordings of oral interviews with Native peoples over the past 150 years. A communal sharing space of oral tales and testimonies would give voice to a threatened culture, as well as an opprtunity for people to relate and share their family histories, personal tales, and outlook. Oral history, after all, is still history, and new methods of preservation need to be considered just as they are for textual records.

I applaud CHNM's efforts in trying to capture the memory of the people involved in historic events. It is a voice, a reservoir of memory. We may have had to give up the bards of old to change for the future, but the role of collective memory in a society need not be sacrificed. By creating a space for the oral tales of Aboriginals, we can ensure the survival of their culture and their language, though it may be in a medium far from traditional. This does not mean that we don't need the storytellers and the bards, we will always need the human element, but this could be an excellent backup drive.

History as Song

History is often associated with the textual and physical past, focusing on the evidence of artefacts and documents to reconstruct times gone by. This is, in fact, what I understood it to be as well, starting as I did from Anthropology and moving into English and then History. What I discovered along the way was a love for legends and mythologies, and the oral traditions that created them. What this interest convinced me of was that there is another way to look at history: through stories.

Before the Greek city-states were at their zenith of cultural achievement, the Celtic tribes dominated Western Europe. Little evidence remains of their tribal life — their social structures and belief systems are fragmentary and mysterious — but their rich culture has echoed through the centuries and is still influential today. To recreate the Celtic world of the misty past, we must turn to their legends and mythologies to unveil their mysteries. Unlike the Roman Empire, which was a strongly visual culture and used awe-inspiring art and architecture to communicate to the diverse cultures and languages they controlled, I believe that the ancient Celts used their songs and legends as forms of communication and education. The Celtic tribes once stretched from the Balkans to Ireland, and they had a lasting impact on the develpoment of Europe that is often overlooked by the seemingly higher culture of Greece and Rome. Celtic tribes were eventually defeated by these emerging strengths; however, the survival of the Celtic culture indicates an enduring method of recording their history. Mythological figures, gods, and legendary exploits surviving in the Celtic realms of Ireland, Scotland, and Wales can demonstrate a common past that through the retelling has become the stuff of fiction.

As historians, public historians, and seekers of heritage, I believe that knowing about the past includes knowing about how the people in the past viewed their own history. How a culture communicates its collective memory is an integral part of their social identity. Listening to the song of the past can give vital clues as to how we should interpret it. Some archives and historians are now recognizing that "history" is not just the written past, but the oral past as well. The University of Dundee in Scotland has a course (as part of regular archives program or as professional development) that teaches how to preserve oral culture in an archival setting.

Legends and mythologies are stories of the past - ones that must be heard in order for us to know how various cultures saw their place in the history of their people.

Roy Rosenzweig’s Scavenger Hunt

Digital History Assignment 2 for September 19, 2007

1. A recording of Leon Trotsky speaking in English.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T7r4zpUEpog

2. 1915 suffrage poem with the line: When all the women wanted it.
http://www.geocities.com/Paris/Bistro/8066/ADMsuffrage.html

3. A letter from George Washington to Timothy Pickering in which Washington complains about "certain forged letters" intended to wound his character and "deceive the people."
http://books.google.ca/books?id=OLiLJsfyrMoC&pg=PA420&dq=certain+forged+letters+intended+to+wound+his+character+and+%22deceive+the+people.%22

4. An 18th century speech by Willie Lynch telling Virginia slave owners how to keep slaves in line.
http://www.thetalkingdrum.com/wil.html

5. An online debate over whether the 1962 Cuban crisis would have been different if Kruschev had sent a fair sized contingent of Russian troops instead of missiles.
I could not find this one. :(

6. A complete version of "Annual Review of Information Technology Developments for Economic and Social Historians, 1993" in The Economic History Review by Roger Middleton and Peter Wardley (one of first publications for historians to talk about Internet).
Found in JSTOR
http://www.jstor.org.proxy2.lib.uwo.ca:2048/view/00130117/di011843/01p01475/0?currentResult=00130117%2bdi011843%2b01p01475%2b0%2cFFFFFFFF&searchUrl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.jstor.org%2Fsearch%2FAdvancedResults%3Fhp%3D25%26si%3D1%26q0%3DAnnual%2BReview%2Bof%2BInformation%2BTechnology%2BDevelopments%2Bfor%2BEconomic%2Band%2BSocial%2BHistorians%26f0%3D%26c0%3DAND%26q1%3DEconomic%2BHistory%2BReview%26f1%3D%26c1%3DAND%26wc%3Don%26sd%3D1993%26ed%3D1993%26la%3D

7. Four syllabi for courses that include Hamlet on the Holodeck by Janet Murray.
http://www.stanford.edu/class/sts145/html/Syllabus2003.htm
http://www.swarthmore.edu/SocSci/tburke1/interpret.html
http://www.units.muohio.edu/englishtech/ENG49502/ENG495syll02.htm
http://www.lcc.gatech.edu/~murray/6210_syl.html

8. The home page for the Center for History & New Media as it looked in 1998.
I am not sure if this one is right…
http://chnm.gmu.edu/index.php

After using the Internet Archives' really interesting search tool, the 'Wayback Machine', I would like to revise my answer to:
http://web.archive.org/web/19980419060247/http://chnm.gmu.edu/

The only drawback to this tool is that you have to know the URL of the site you are looking for. So, if it ever changed its URL address, you can not search by subject or title, and it would make finding the old site very difficult.

9. A picture of Janet Murray together with the Sims.
http://images.google.ca/imgres?imgurl=http://homepage.mac.com/voyager/images/janetmurray.jpg&imgrefurl=http://voyager.blogs.com/voyeurism/educational_technology/index.html&h=489&w=652&sz=274&hl=en&start=1&tbnid=3lUZ0emIuw2WAM:&tbnh=104&tbnw=138&prev=/images%3Fq%3Djanet%2Bmurray%2Bsims%26gbv%3D2%26svnum%3D10%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DG

I actually really enjoyed this exercise. It let me realise that I do have some search skills, while also showing me that there is much, much more for me to learn. I know that I will never be able to understand everything about the Internet or computers (I never actually figured out exactly what a 'SIMS' was), but I am feeling better every day about the elastic nature of my brain to take in, and maybe even understand, something of what we are doing in realtion to my age-old enemy, the computer.

Archivists: those curious creatures

For everyone who has ever wondered what an archive is and how it is run and were too afraid to ask, here is a wonderful video put together by Bob Stewart in 1990 to help explain what an archive is and how it is organised. It's a fun and hilarious video, I really recommend watching it, and he was one of the best archivists in the field. The B.C. Conference of the United Church of Canada is actually naming their archives the Bob Stewart Archives after this remarkable man. Here is his video:


http://www.bc.united-church.ca/archives/Bob_Stewart/index.htm

Enjoy!

What Really Happened to the Dinosaurs?

The truth of what really happened to the dinosaurs has been conjectured and postulated upon for decades by every dino-loving professional and hobbyist. There's the comet theory, the slow elimination theory, the creationist theory, and so many many more. One I read recently was that it was the unexpected arrival of the flower with its odious flaunting of flavours that threw the veggies off of their feed, and as they slowly wasted away, it then left little to be desired for the carnivorous diet - don't worry folks, it was in a fictitious field that I read this. But it brings up an interesting point. What is it about new arrivals that throws us off so quickly? Because it is not just dinosaurs, people are always suspicious at first of things they do not understand. This has been the consistent theme in our readings this week for Digital History.
The advance of the Internet as an historical source has been contested at almost every new development. To the computer-savvy group, it has been a positive change; for those less inclined to the techno-world, it has been for the worst, with constant ever-evolving changes and horrible new developments. Change rarely smells good to those not used to its scent. I have to admit that I am somewhere in the middle. I am of the generation that should know computers, but I don't. I can go through the motions and generally keep afloat, but I never really understand. And I am sure we all know from our humanities background, that we fear what we do not understand. I think the Internet allows history to reach millions of people that would never have been able to before, which is great. Knowledge should not be hoarded. But, I do feel sorry for the old school scholars who are being thrown off their over-used metaphor of an ivory tower and made to go the way of the dinosaur. Can we not have the best of both worlds? And I understand about the "old making way for the new," but don't we lose something valuable in the process? Like dinosaurs? That could have been fun - T-Rex's for the army, pterodactyls for transportation, dino eggs for breakfast...I kid!
Cohen and Rosenzweig say in Promises and Perils of Digital History that "instantaneous access to primary and secondary sources - the ability to very quickly make and test out intellectual connections - will likely alter historical research and writing in ways that we haven't yet imagined." And that's the thing: we do not know the full ramifications of the Internet and blogs and digitised sources. We never do with any kind of new development. I think the lesson that we can take from history (and from the dinos) is that balance is key. Just in case the Internet and computers end up being our asteroid in some Terminator-style future, we need to still try and preserve the original documents and artefacts that are so important to our historical identity.
Don't fear the flower, but be aware that it may cause indigestion.

What did I create?

Apparently I created a blog. Having no idea what a blog is, this comes as a bit of a surprise.