Due by March 7
- The first historiography post (about 1,500 words) should analyze how one particular digital tool or platform has already affected various types of historical inquiry. This post should include Chicago-style footnotes. Images, hyperlinks, and embedded maps are also encouraged but not required. Late posts will be penalized 5 points per day.
Suggestions
- Define historical inquiry to include history scholarship, pedagogy or public presentation. In other words, you might consider how a digital tool has affected academic writing, classroom teaching or museum displays.
- There are an almost infinite number of possible tools or platforms to consider, but here are some of the most obvious candidates (in alphabetical order): augmented reality, blogging, data mining, digitization, GIS, social media, TEI, and word clouds.
- Remember, however, when researching the impact of such tools or platforms that your scope of research is actually quite recent. JSTOR alone will not suffice. You will have to experiment with a combination of databases (including news and library) and even basic Google searches to identify examples of impact within the last several years in the historical field.
Due by April 18
- The second historiography post (about 1,500 words) should focus on the interpretive trends within a particular field of historical inquiry (preferably related to the student’s final web project) and then try to explain how digital tools might affect these debates if applied effectively. This post should also include Chicago-style footnotes. Late posts will be penalized 5 points per day.
Suggestions
- If the first post looked backward in the recent past, then second post peers ahead into the short-term future. This is usually called a “state-of-the-field” essay, a form of historiography that outlines recent work and suggests fruitful directions for future work.
NOTE: Students may incorporate all or part of their revised essays into their final web project.