Post on 25-Dec-2015
transcript
Computerization and Electronic Texts
Brendan Rapple AD140
Spring, 2003 Boston College
Today
word processing
simple searching of online
databases or catalogs account for most use by humanists
However, scientists, technologists are much heavier users of computers.
Other Uses of Technology
Creation of such general resources as dictionaries and bibliographies.
Retrospective conversion of manuscript or printed sources into machine-readable form.
Creation of specific research tools, such as databases and image banks.
Computer Graphics (think of archaeologists, architects etc.)
Computers Greatly Facilitate Retrieval of Information
Limiting by specific fields and formats and the use of Boolean searching.
Advances the Research Process
Swifter searching of databases
Browsing of online table of contents of journals
Full-text documents
Indexes and abstracts are being published more quickly
Other Publishing Benefits of the Web
Illustrations and even animation on Web pages;
One can be very innovative with respect to style: the power of easy linking the aesthetic attractiveness displayed by many Web
pages lengthy footnotes inclusion of raw data
ELECTRONIC COMMUNICATION
News of work in progress, often including exchange of copies of papers.
Ongoing conversation with specialists elsewhere.
E-mail often allows the researcher to handle more important responsibilities -- ordinary business can get done more quickly.
Other Networked Information
Electronic Archives
Automated Library Catalogs
Full-text Databases
Bibliographic Databases
E-Journals
Graphics
Animation
Video
Census Data
Numerical Databases
Digitization of Picture and Slide Collections and Archives
Production of Multimedia Courseware and Interactive Learning Sessions
A Scholar can Consult
Digital image collections from the Vatican or the Louvre
Digital text archives at major universities
Online journals
Bibliographies
Information on scholarly societies
Moving images -- Video
Online catalogs
Dissertations
Increasingly, sound files
Syllabi for thousands of academic courses
And much more
Digital Images
Archaeologists, art historians, geographers, and historians are making increasing use of digital image processing.
Many museums, large and small, host online exhibitions – one in effect goes on a virtual tour of the galleries.
Sound Files
Delivering sound files across a network enhances online scholarship in music.
The Journal of Seventeenth Century Music, a refereed journal, provides audio.
Ethnomusicology Online features peer-reviewed articles, all accompanied by illustrative audio
files and multimedia.
Retroconversion Projects
The great advantage is access to rare texts or other
materials that are brittle, damaged, or not easily
accessible.
Microfilm
Microfilm, long used as a means of preserving
brittle books, is also being digitized.
The Notion of a “Virtual Library”
Some Drawbacks to the WWW
Missing, defective, or outdated links
Difficulties in ascertaining the authority behind most Web sites
Misleading titles of many sites
Sheer amount of material available.
Other General Objections Include
Possible inauthenticity.
Possible substitution of quantity for quality.
Fear of researchers that they will no longer be needed as
teachers.
Big Problem is “Quality”
Much of the material on the Web is junk.
Nevertheless Change is Nigh
Electronic access and approaches to research in most disciplines are here to stay.
Print Technology
Evolved over a long period of time.
Books consist of pages delivering text in a single linear sequence.
Page numbers and running heads used for identification purposes.
Books often include tables of contents and back-of-the book indexes.
Footnotes, bibliographies, illustrations etc. provide additional methods of cross-referencing.
A title page provides a convention for identifying the book and its author and publication details.
Book’s length often determined by publishers' costs, rather than
by what the author really wants to say about subject.
Electronic Technology
More difficult to read it sequentially than on paper -- still we can read it.
Moreover, we can search and manipulate the information in many different ways.
No need for back-of-the-book index -- we can search for any word or phrase using the seek/find command.
We no longer need to read whole book to find one paragraph, but can just access the piece of information we need.
We can find a bibliographic reference and go immediately to the place to which it points.
We can count instances of features within the information.
A work may never be considered as completely finished.
Very idea of what constitutes a publication may change.
Fundamental revolution in communication
The Individual Scholar As Publisher
Simplest approach is for individual scholar to do it herself -- however, many need help.
Though much nonsense is on the web, it’s still an excellent medium for publishing serious, scholarly work.
No longer any need for most people to learn the intricacies of HTML code.
Advantages of Publishing on WWW
Comparatively little cost involved.
Bypass often lengthy processes of print publication. Personal web sites have a high degree of immediacy and accessibility.
Offers the possibility of reaching a new audience -- not limited to world of colleges/universities/scholars.
Contact between user of a Web site and its authors can be
direct and immediate.
Disadvantages of Publishing on WWW
A poorly designed Web site may appear amateurish and non-scholarly.
Self-published e-texts have, generally, bypassed usual system of peer review/“quality control.”
Individually published e-texts may disappear without a
trace.
Thesaurus Linguae Graecae (TLG)
The Dictionary of Old English (DOE)
The Dartmouth Dante Project Database
Wesleyan Confucian Project
The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
GREAT UNION CATALOGS
OCLC (WorldCat) RLIN
Combined Sources/Multimedia
Hypermedia systems link such media as• images• animation• sound• video
to text.
American Memory(Multimedia--Library of Congress)
Primary source and archival materials relating to American culture and history.
Valley of the Shadow: Two Communities
in the American Civil War
Examines the communities, daily life, politics,
and religious and racial conflicts surrounding
the Civil War.
The Victorian Women Writers Project (Indiana University)
Transcriptions of rare literary works, etc. by British women writers of late nineteenth century.
U. of Virginia Library's Early
American Fiction Archive
About 582 volumes of early American fiction.
Electronic Journals
E.G.: JSTOR
Project Muse
Emerald Library
Preservation of Digital Data
Considering how quickly software and hardware
become obsolete, the danger is clear.