Author: Jocelyn Hernandez

Text Searching and Digital Media

I think since elementary school, teachers have been teaching us how to use Google and databases to narrow down sources for big essays, which is something that older generations did not have access to. It helps filter down information that may have taken hours to look for in a physical library before text searching existed. The secondary sources that are found during text searching help find primary resources that are necessary for some research projects or questions to support the argument. I think that in a less academic way as well, using search engines has become such a daily activity to answer quick questions or look for information in everyday life that it has made knowledge accessible to almost everyone with internet.

Digital projects can help make the way someone or an audience comprehends the topic it is trying to target. Referring back to last week’s project, “The Knotted Line” used an interactive timeline to engage the user in the history of prison reform and strides of freedom in the U.S., in addition to allowing the user to add their own personal experiences to comment section of the timeline. To me at least, as confusing as it was, it made me want to look for the next box on information and made me want to keep reading and I feel like that should be a goal for someone creating digital history project. It keeps the reader engaged and wanting to get informed on whatever topic it is referring to. In reference to social change, the more people find interest in the topic, the more it is talked about and something gets done about it.

In terms of something being gained, whatever topic of history is being talked gets a more modernized sense of being, therefore making it more relatable and understandable for the user to absorb the knowledge. It also reaches a larger audience than keeping it in a set location, which can also tie back to the first paragraph that talks about how it can help us engage with information.

References:

Guidone, Tony. 9 Sept. 2019.

Milligan, Ian. “Illusionary Order: Online Databases, Optical Character Recognition, and Canadian History, 1997–2010 .” Project Muse, Dec. 2013, https://muse-jhu-edu.mutex.gmu.edu/article/527016.

Blog #1

 Initially, I was very confused as to what Professor Jess meant when she said that we were going to use digital tools to look and examine the 1930’s and the Great Depression because, there wasn’t much of the “digital” aspect to technology at that time (at least to my knowledge). However, going through my readings I learned that by using interactive tools and using modern technology to look at that past in a new perspective, it opens up a new narrative that helps us understand and examine that time period in a new way. I also appreciate the different platforms we are using to discuss the events that occurred. We are talking about events during the Great Depression that maybe weren’t so talked about in high school, giving us a chance to fully comprehend the era. By giving us podcasts, videos, and articles to listen/read, it builds on that previous statement of helping us comprehend by giving us different methods of absorbing the information if one way helps us learn better than the other.

              The project given to me was “The Knotted Line”, an interactive tool that helps examine and measure “freedom” and uses miniature paintings from movements throughout the United States between the 1940’s and now to explore the question “How is freedom measured?”. It also allows for people to insert their own experiences on if they ever felt as if they weren’t allowed to publicly gather with people like them.

              To analyze it using Miriam Posner’s framework, “The Knotted Line” would be considered a gallery of primary sources that uses multimedia (i.e miniature paintings from the movements) to examine the different movements and the extent that freedom had in that particular era. By making it interactive and available to insert personal experiences, it allows the user to compare changes, if any, that have occurred in terms of the “freedom” movement through the late 20th and 21st century. It also allows the user to move along the timeline and view other people’s responses, so one could see other people’s experiences in addition to their own. However, the timeline itself seemed a bit difficult to use. The lines would just move as you move your cursor over it and you have keep clicking until you eventually find a piece of information hidden under the interactive lines.

Sources:

Posner, Miriam. “How Did They Make That?” Miriam Posners Blog, 1 Feb. 2014, http://miriamposner.com/blog/how-did-they-make-that/#network.

The Knotted Line, http://knottedline.com/tkl.html.

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