weisner

At the beginning of the semester, I was skeptical that I would ever really grasp the tools and skills necessary to build a website. Computers were an intimidating technological advance, and my grasp of internet resources was pretty basic. However, Digital History taught me so much about technology and I feel infinitely more comfortable around computers and the internet. Most importantly, I am proud of the knowledge that I accumulated and the website that I created.

I think Henry’s Diary was a good choice for a final project. I would work on this same project again, although there were certainly some challenges and a good deal of work involved. A large amount of my time was spent on the content of the website. I tape-recorded my interview with Henry so I had to transcribe the tapes into notes. Henry had a very thick German accent and he tended to use a combination of English and German. I often had to look up names, places and objects to clarify exactly what Henry was talking about. Once I completed my transcriptions, I formulated a proper timeline that corresponded with the information Henry gave me. Again, this required some fact checking since his memory on ages and dates was not always reliable. The only real drawback to this project was the lack of photographs or documents from Henry’s life in Poland and Germany. I think family photos or images of war would have greatly strengthened the website and made it even more personal. Sadly, any photographs and documents were lost over time.

On the whole, Henry was fascinating to interview and his story was very memorable. I had always wanted to hear his story, and this project provided me the perfect opportunity to document a small part of his life. It was also a good opportunity to practice writing for a younger audience. Although I think Henry’s story is intriguing to all ages, I also believe his personal narrative is a good way to lend a personal angle to World War II history in the classroom. Finally, the project gave me a chance to experiment with the blog software. While we kept a blog throughout class, I had never really played around with the options or design. After completing this project, I firmly believe it was the right medium.

I wanted this project to be much more interactive than a simple paper. Digital media allowed me to build a project that included photographs, maps and timelines for a more immersive experience than a standard paper. I also knew that I wanted to build a website directed at a younger audience. It would be most successful if the viewers could connect with Henry. I wrote in first person and in an informal style to truly capture Henry’s story and draw in the audience. The only drawback was my lack of experience in working with digital media. This project took more time because much of the learning experience was trial and error. While everything worked out in the end, I had to play around with the Wordpress website and template for awhile before deciding on the look and feel of my site.

There were various aspects of technology I had to figure out while completing this project. Although I was somewhat familiar with Wordpress, I had to figure out how to change the template, arrange the sidebar to showcase the features I wanted, and remove the timestamp to give the blog a more authentic feel. In the end, it was not that difficult and I have learned a lot. However at the time, it took me awhile to design the look of my blog.

I also built about fifteen small webpages that I inserted throughout the blog, containing background information and visuals. Again, figuring out the design took a good deal of time. Now, I feel very comfortable editing and improving images on Adobe Photoshop or building a page on Dreamweaver. Wordpress, Dreamweaver and Adobe were all sufficient in building my webpage. The only aspect of Wordpress that I found to be constraining involved the order or chronology of my blog. I separated out the entries by year on the sidebar, but it is a little difficult to navigate straight through the blog since the posts are listed chronologically. Basically, Henry’s last entry appears on the front page of the blog. It is easiest to navigate by year from the sidebar, but you still have to scroll down to the bottom of the page to read the earliest entry by date. While there were challenges, I feel better equipped in the technological world and this project was definitely a learning process.

I am definitely happy with the final version of my website. The content and basic design lived up to my expectations. However, there were a few additions and changes I would make, given more time. To begin with, I would add more journal entries. While I presented the main events in Henry’s life, there were still large gaps in time. If given the chance, I would love to flesh out his daily life in greater detail. This would include more information about growing up in Poland and Germany, his family and his career. Secondly, I would add more links and background information to each of the entries. I added pages to portions of the diary that called for obvious explanation or imagery, but there are certainly many more opportunities for expansion and visuals.

If given infinite time and resources, I would also add audio and video components to the website. Placing excerpts from Henry’s interview online in an audio format would be an amazing resource. More interactive maps, such as a Google map for the areas of Europe to which Henry traveled, would also greatly strengthen the site. I would also include a lesson plan within the website, with recommendations of where exactly Henry’s Diary could fit into the curriculum. This would hopefully involve working with a teacher to assist in coming up with standards, objectives, and stronger educational components on the site. Finally, if I were to expand the project, I would think about including other oral histories. It would be interesting to present different perspectives from World War II. Ideally, these would be stories that are not often captured in history, just as Henry’s story is a new perspective. Multiple stories would also strengthen the educational aspect and provide great opportunities for comparison and contrast.

Henry’s Diary.

First of all, I went ahead and played around on Wikipedia for awhile, searching for some way to contribute/edit. It’s amazing how much stuff is on that site…and it’s really funny that anyone can contribute anything they want. Being able to write an entry myself, I now understand how ridiculous it is that anyone would attempt to cite Wikipedia as a “scholarly source” (as some of my students in the past have done on papers). While I made my post as accurate as possible, clearly others do not take the time to check facts, nor really care. However, it is a great starting point for research topics or general background information! Anyway, I thought I would contribute/edit the post about my alma mater, Notre Dame. However, Wikipedia has a HUGE entry already and I didn’t see any openings… so I ended up creating a small reference site for my old dorm at ND. The  link was on the page, but no one had tackled it yet. Here it is…Pangborn Hall. It’s pretty short, but a good starting place for anyone with more time/motivation!

While all three site were interesting to browse, I was most attracted to the last two. To begin with, I was fascinated by the Pepys’ diary, especially since I’m planning on using it as a loose model for my own website. I love that reading someone’s diary can really transport you to a different time, and the web makes it so accessible for anyone to check out. I can’t imagine how many more people are using this web version than the one in print. Additionally. it provides you with the opportunity to move outside just his story and into more history (via the links). This is a format I hope to copy in my website. The annotations at the end of each entry also provide a great way to insert my own voice for clarification or other neccessary info. that I can’t include in an entry. While Samuel’s diary is amazingly thorough and possesses a ton on information, I can hopefully make a similar, smaller version.

I also loved the history carnival website. It seems to be well managed and reliable, as each post has to be submitted to the host or the co-coordinator. (Although I’m not sure if actual historic content is edited so it may not be totally dependable). It’s also a huge network which is incredibly well organized to handle numerous submissions. I think it’s great that the carnival welcomes such a broad range of applicants…you do not need to be a professional historian or scholar, you must only have an interest in history. This certainly widens the audience as well. Each carnival I checked out contains a ton of links and information, although the presentation varies. Some (like the Tigerliy Lounge: History Carnival XX) are a little more ambitious from a design standpoint while others have a much simpler format (Musings of a Grad Student). However the high level of content remains in each edition. What a great resource.

One of the most interesting aspects to the copyright issue and the web is that of increased responsibility as both the author and publisher. In the chapter of Digital History on “owning the past”, Rosenzweig and Cohen discuss how the web changes issues of copyright. Accessiblity is one angle which I didn’t think about, especially from the standpoint of an author. You hear about issues of plagerism and how the internet has made it easier for students or authors to plagerize. On the flip side, it is also true that the internet makes it easier to track instances of plagerism. But I never really considered how copyright issues were blurred, not just changed. The authors mention that while passing out copies of a poem in class is a violation of copyright, the consequences are much more severe if that same posting is noticed on the internet. Is the violation worse only because it can be traced? Or because it is much more accessible?

Additionally, Rosenzweig and Cohen mention that the responsibility falls heavier on one who publishes on the web. There are no lawyers run interference. That extra responsibility is a scary thought! However, I’m glad there are some “loopholes”, as you could call them. The flexibility of the web allows an author to run a few more risks, or toe the line more closely, because changes can be made quickly and easily. This arguement about the “ease” of solving copyright issues makes me feel a little better about my project! Additionally, as the book points out, our sites are not really targets because of their small scale. I guess I’ll worry more about these issues should I decide to tackle larger projects. It’s nice to have to knowledge at least!

The site I’ve chosen is the official website for the Kentucky Derby. Ok, so it’s a little bit random.  Allow me to explain my choice. The site itself is probably not the most attractive layout you will ever see. In fact, the front page is crammed with information so it may seem a little bit overwhelming. However, it’s actually easy to navigate and has all the information you would ever want about horseracing and Derby in particular. I like horseracing and I follow it pretty closely, especially in the few weeks leading up to Derby. So first and foremost, it is designed to be a great resource and lays out the information right up front. You can easily navigate to updates, follow developing stories, watch recaps, read newspaper columns and editorials, look up history and find out information about actually attending. I’ve been to Derby the past few years and the site is a huge help. Additionally, it has video, audio clips, interviews, and photos, along with the textual information.  It’s colorful, interesting and interactive.

After forumulating my project proposal, I found much of this chapter of Digital History to be incredibly helpful. For example, the section on Text discusses issues such as font style and length of text.  While font style seems to be such a tiny detail, there are some good insights about contrast and the use of specific styles. Additionally, this section addresses academic sites and the length of text which should be included. “Chunking” of text is an accepted strategy and it is widely believed that short passages of text are best used on educational sites. The audience has a short attention span and dislikes to read text on screen.  More recently, longer text passages have become more prominent, as screen technology improves. This seems to bode well for my plan to present my site as a blog. There will be a decent amount of text but it will be easy to load, will quickly capture interest and allow for easy reading.

The section on images and multimedia also offers some small, helpful suggestions.  Using a thumbnail image allows the site to load quickly, and the designer can place the images close together for comparison and contrast.  Smaller images might look better in a blog post and I like the idea of using a small thumbnail as a link to another location. However, I think that a full size image showing up on the page as soon as the viewer arrives at the site has a strong impact as well.  Colors and image size are great ways to help emphasize a point, but it’s also important not to get caught up in the “bells and whistles” and end up with something tacky.

As a sidenote, it is really helpful to be able to view the examples within the Digital History sections. It is something that I’ve taken for granted throughout the reading, but it really came through in this chapter. The details about color, font and text are much better understood when one can view them online as opposed to reading a book and having to imagine an example.

As another sidenote - I have never really given much thought to web standards before reading this chapter and the discussion about adhering to web standards. There are ten very convincing reasons to learn the standards, especially Number Six, which mentions providing a foundation for accessibility.  The final section of our Digital History chapter discusses accessibility as well. I had never heard of Sections 508 or 504 before this reading. I would like to discuss their ramifications to the digital world more in class!

People connect with history when it is presented in a personal and engaging fashion.  This is the critical concept that underlies my project proposal.  For my semester project, I propose to build a website that will center on the personal narrative of a German immigrant.  Henry Sobcek, a distant cousin, grew up in Germany and fought under Hitler during World War II.  After the war, he worked for British intelligence and later settled in the United States.  His narrative will ideally allow visitors to my site to form a personal connection with an individual, fostering a better understanding of a specific period in history.

My website will be directed at students, specifically towards a middle school aged audience.  It is at this point that students are exposed to a curriculum that includes information on World War II and immigration.  Ideally, my site will be utilized within one of these broader units.  I want the students to take from my site a deeper understanding of these two historical events.  I have already interviewed Henry and collected a great deal of oral history.  Based on this information, I will conduct further research on the people, places and events that Henry discussed.  Although his story will be the focus of my website, it will be used in conjunction with my background research on Germany, World War II and immigration.  Any images and maps will come from the internet and will therefore already be digitized.

I plan to organize the information in chronological order by tracing the events of Henry’s life.  I will give some brief background information on Henry’s childhood in Poland and Germany.  I will then address his military service in the Hitler youth groups and later the Nazi army.  Finally, I will discuss his immigration to the United States after the war.  At this point, I am tentatively planning on using a blog as my basic web building tool.  Each post will represent a different point in Henry’s life and will contain the basic narrative, photographs and maps.  It would be easy for students to navigate and contribute to the personal aspect of the site.

The creation of this website has multiple benefits for me, personally and professionally.  On a personal level, it is a great opportunity for me to interview Henry and document his story.  I have grown up hearing about his life, yet no one in my family has ever written it down.  On a professional level, I am interested in working in the area of education after I receive my degree.  This website allows me to gather material with an educational purpose, while learning how to interpret the historical information for a younger audience.

• I enjoyed browsing through the websites associated with American Quarterly, and the topic of Hypertext Scholarship in American Studies. Rosenzweig’s essay on hypertext scholarship provided a great synopsis of the project, and the positive or negative consequences related to publishing academic essays online. I think one of the largest benefits to using new technology is the interaction with the text and images. This interaction was largely showcased in the websites posted for this week. For example, I really enjoyed playing with the essay about comic strips. The viewer can read briefly over the information, just like an academic paper. However, you can also interact with the strips by clicking on them for a larger view and a link to more in depth text. This is a way to present much more information about a topic. An author is not quite so concerned with spatial limitations on a website as opposed to a written paper. Additionally, an interactive essay/project is just more interesting!

• However, Rosenzweig does mention some serious drawbacks/problems with hypertext. While articles online from American Quarterly may be more accessible, they may also come with a usage fee. Additionally, there are technical concerns about the presentation of a page and making sure the format is the same on all web browsers. However, there are other problems which go outside of the technical realm. An audience must adapt to a new method of reading comprehension when an essay/article is presented in hypertext. Rosenzweig discusses the idea of “standards” which allow a scholar to immediately pick out a thesis, supporting evidence and sources after only a quick appraisal. However, information in hypertext is clearly laid out differently. This also relates to “reader expectations” and the idea that there is so much information on the site, the viewer cannot possibly read it all. At what point should he or she stop? When is it enough? I feel like I’ve encountered this problem before, especially in this class which is so heavily based on websites and online articles. When have I skimmed over or browsed through an article or site a sufficient amount? Although these concerns are real, they mostly involve a willingness to work outside the standard format or box. Scholars and students alike are going to have to adapt to new ways of learning…

• I briefly wanted to mention David Bell’s article A Bookless Future: What the Internet is Doing to Scholarship. Bell brings up numerous points in his article and I especially enjoyed the section on why reading text on the computer screen is so uncomfortable. I’m glad I’m not alone in feeling this way. But his thoughts on the democratizing effect of the internet were really insightful. It’s amazing that researchers in any part of the world basically have access to the same material, as long as they possess a computer. You are no longer at an immediate disadvantage by living far away from cities with important resources (i.e. the Library of Congress). Although there is a benefit to having all of D.C. at my fingertips, I find that a lot of the research I need to do for a project can be found online as well. It’s amazing how much that can even the playing field.

My semester project is focused on the story of my cousin Henry’s immigration from Nazi Germany to the United States. Clearly, a large part of this project is dependant upon the oral history I will collect from Henry. However, I wanted to survey the digital landscape in order to gain some awareness of what has already been done and what resources I could use in my own website.

First of all, a little background on my proposed site is necessary to understand my searching approach and goals. Ideally, my website will be used for educational purposes. While it is the story of one man, it is an exceptional story which should be shared. However, it is also only one of millions of exceptional stories which are possessed by immigrants to America. Henry’s story could be used as an example of one of these narratives. A case study of Henry’s life could also be used as part of a larger unit on immigration. Personal accounts certainly contribute to a deeper understanding of the challenges and experiences which immigrants faced. My site will appeal to a younger audience. It will allow them to form a personal connection to the story of an immigrant and possibly lead to a better understanding of how immigration shaped the country and affected individuals involved.

I used Google as my search engine and I entered various key words and phrases in an attempt to bring up different sites. First and foremost, I wanted to get an idea of how prevalent the idea of an immigrant’s story was on the web. I started with a Google search of “immigrant personal stories”. A PBS site entitled Destination America was the first, and most common, hit that came up. This site is a collection of immigrants’ stories and encourages the visitor to submit his or her own information in a questionnaire with drop down menus. It is a reliable educational site and it is incredibly broad in its coverage of immigration.

Another site I stumbled across was an Encyclopedia of USA History with a focus on immigration. This site allowed me to go directly to a link about Germany. From there, I could go to a section on German Resistance and than read through numerous personal accounts and biographies. Since my cousin Henry fled Germany, this section on resistance seems like it might be an interesting resource for comparison with other stories.

The Library of Congress also showed up frequently throughout my searching project. It seems to have a huge number of sites devoted to documenting the immigrant story in the U.S. Unfortunately, the entire web system for the Library of Congress was unavailable while I was conducting my research so I’ll have to go back and look at the websites when they are back online.

After searching immigration in general, I attempted to find “German immigrant stories” specifically. This led me to a huge website from the University of Wisconsin with many books, images and collections online. All of these areas focus on immigration in the 19^th century. Within the site, there is a collection of newspaper articles and stories by or about German immigrants. It is organized by date and contains text about numerous people. In a way, its purpose seems similar to the PBS site. It is a broad survey of immigration. However, it seems more likely to be used by those interested in higher level educational research, whereas PBS would appeal more to the casual visitor searching for general background on immigration.

At this point in my search, I left off looking for immigrant stories alone and took a more technical approach. I browsed through a few ancestry websites, such as the Ellis Island site and an Ancestry site in order to gain an understanding of the information these sites provided. The Ellis Island website is a great resource for anyone doing research on immigration, whether it is for a class or for their family history. The website is huge, providing an opportunity for you to search for a family member, read about the history of Ellis Island, view photo albums, read about immigration patterns in America and even check out a few individual stories. There are tons of images and great interactive maps. It seems to span the gap between a site intended for research and a site intended for the recreational user. Although Ellis Island itself is not really relevant to my project, it is a truly amazing website. I’m definitely planning on referencing the set-up, graphics and information on this site when I build my own.

Finally, I attempted to search from an educational angle. I looked up immigrant stories or personal journeys that were used as teaching or classroom resources. However, there are very few lesson plans or curriculum suggestions that really utilize case studies of immigrants. The Library of Congress site does have a site entitled Immigration in the American Memory under their section on resources for teachers and students. I plan on checking this out but, basically, the educational angle was a dead end and I didn’t spend too much time browsing this topic.

The information on many of these sites is presented mostly with text. Most of the sites use a few photographs of the immigrants, but the stories are largely just presented in a few paragraphs of writing. While there are many opportunities for an individual to share his or her personal story on various websites, there are very few interactive aspects to the sites. PBS and Ellis Island are probably the major exceptions to this rule. The Destination America site relies heavily on graphics, images and has a great interactive map. However, this site is more conducive to browsing than research and probably reaches a broader audience than the more academic or research based sites. I would imagine that Ellis Island attracts a large number of visitors as well, which probably explains the amount of interactive features. Research based sites do not feel the need to equip their information with all the “bells and whistles”.

Most of the websites I found useful are directed at an adult audience. I am guessing this is probably because it is typically teenagers and adults who are surfing the web or doing research. These websites do, however, address a wide range of purposes. Most of the genealogy sites would be used by people specifically seeking immigration information. The PBS site is intended for the causal viewer who is possibly following up on the show that was on TV. The Library of Congress sites or the website put together by the University of Wisconsin is intended to assist people in conducting research. Clearly, the layout and makeup of the websites change based on the intended audience.

I could not find any immigrant story that had its own site and was directed at a young audience. I envision my site as presenting Henry’s story in a very simple way. Ideally, it will have a few maps to trace his immigration, and multiple images to supplement the narrative. I want it to be easy to navigate and understood by grade school children. It needs to be a site to which a teacher could direct the class as an example of one man’s story in a larger unit on immigration. Based on my survey of the digital landscape, there is nothing like this on the web. I know that many schools and teachers do not fully take advantage of the internet in the classroom. I wonder if this partially explains the lack of educational, historic websites directed at children. Although there are some great educational websites (such as Teaching with Historic Places), the use of the internet as a teaching resource is still a relatively new concept.

Basically, I’ve discovered that immigration is a very broad topic and there are thousands of websites dedicated to exploring some angle which relates to this historic theme. Based on the searches I conducted, it seems as though most of the information on the web is not focused on an in-depth case study. While many sites do offer biographies or accounts of immigrants, none of them present a detailed personal narrative.

While much of my research cannot be gathered from the web, I was able to discover a great deal of useful information from surveying the sites already published. I’m sure I’ll be able to use some of the images, maps and other types of visuals on my own site once I gather the information. However, it is nice to know that my intended project will be filling a void in presenting an in-depth case study for a younger audience.

Powerpoint cannot completely make your presentation. Nor can it completely break it either.

After reading Tufte’s article, and the discussion thread which followed, this statement basically sums up what I found to be the most important point. Obvious, but important. As a speaker, powerpoint can really supplement your talk. It can keep the audience engaged and interested and provide a great way to highlight your main points. However, it could also really detract from what you are saying as well. You can’t rely on powerpoint to do the work for you. Your speech must be able to stand alone as well.

I guess what I took from this article is that we should appriciate the value of what can be done with powerpoint, but not slack off on the information that is being presented. It relates to the idea of technology and website design: flashy graphics are great but don’t neglect the substance/text.