Reflection... What an Iguana does best!

I can see the light at the end of the tunnel… Except Plaza Midwood doesn’t have a tunnel. (Maybe they could have used one under the railroad tracks on Central. That would have changed the area’s history!) The Plaza Midwood project draws to a close on Thursday with our final presentation of our online exhibit, From the Miracle Mile to Plaza Midwood. So how was the experience of researching and building an Omeka.net exhibit as a group? What did we learn about Plaza Midwood and its context within Charlotte?

...if her web writing had a diet, it would eat A LOT of steak!

Or maybe just not.  I am an iguana, after all.  No meat here!

Academic writing can be so staid and boring.  Especially if you don't really have a lot of interest in what you're reading. Some classmates and I were having a discussion about our theses the other night during a peer review session.  They mentioned that, despite the fact that they would never really care about my topic for their own research, they liked what I wrote.  Apparently, my enthusiasm about public transportation in Charlotte is fun to read.  One of them noted that they could hear my voice speaking the words as they read the paper. But is this an accurate portrayal?  These classmates know me, so familiarity would seemingly incline their opinion of my writing to be more favorable.

This makes me wonder--what is enjoyable reading?  Is it writing aimed at mass audiences on the web?  Or is it concisely-penned prose, regardless of its medium of publication?  I think we can all agree that clear, gramatically-correct writing is best.  However, what about style?

...the ease of digital access could make us dumber--or not.

I Wrote Them Down in My Diary

I think of this line from Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade often.  Unlike the elephant, I forget.  My iguana mate teasingly calls me his "little goldfish," playing off that animal's 3-second memory span.  I am the worst at remembering the title and author of a book I just read.  The ability to quickly Google that information, however, allows my seeming incompetence to quickly be reversed.  I've become very good at looking up information because of this.

...that Twitter is a tool for education, but not the strongest.

Beyond Bieber: Twitter improves student learning (Michigan State news release)

Christine Greenhow, an assistant professor of education at Michigan State, thinks so.  In Twitteracy: Tweeting as a New Literary Practice, she determines that "college students who tweet as part of their instruction are more engaged with the course content and with the teacher and other students, and have higher grades."

...she didn't know Zotero has been around so long!

But this nice article by Daniel J. Cohen made me wonder, "Why didn't I know about this before?"

I blogged about my discovery a few weeks ago.  But Cohen presents other way that this useful tool may enhance historical scholarship.

...that she has a dirty little secret.

Writing has never been FUN for me.  I do it because I have to.  I needs be, I can sit and pound out a blog entry or research paper.  But I can honestly say that I have never sat down and wrote something because it was simply fun.

Now, that being said, everything in this blog by David Voekler is absolutely correct.

...the Wikipedia is okie dokie (sometimes)!

I am a rabid user of Wikipedia.  Want to find out some random factiod?  CTRL + T, en.wikipedia.org, type it in, and tada!  Knowledge!

But like any resource we use, it must be evaluated and parsed.  I find Wikipedia to be generally reliable.  The only issues I hear of completely erroneous information are usually pages of political figures or celebrities.

...she likes writing contracts more than she likes reading them.

I now know how to use "shall" properly in legalese.  Shall implies obligation.  But it's not "must," which implies requirement.

You shall read on.

...try this new archival tool.

(The History Iguana has a confession.  She doesn't really pay much attention to the Grad Life emails.  It's mostly because she lives down on the beach, so going to the events is usually inconvenient.  However, HI does believe that the best way to learn is to do.)

An upcoming workshop is on the archival tool Zotero.  What is that?  It's an interface that helps you organize your digital files for research, brought to us from our friends at George Mason...  The same friends who have given us Omeka.

Since I won't be going to the workshop, I decided to try playing with it here at home.  I downloaded the standalone version, since the Firefox one didn't work for me.  It's surprisingly easy.

 

All you have to do is add an item, type in all the gooey information, link to a file, and VOILA! You can also organize your items by collection (sound familiar?).  

I decided to give this a go after attempting to organize my thesis research.

...she has never heard of this archive. Why is that?

I moved to Charlotte exactly six years ago today.  For those of you who have just moved here, you'll learn the first question asked of you is, "Where are you from?"  When I would reply, "Louisiana," the next question would be, "Are you here because of the hurricane?"

...that she needs a second post about plug-ins!

Another useful plug-in for Omeka.net is CSV Imports.  Why, you ask...

Truth be told, Omeka can be a bit clunky when it comes to data entry.  By utilizing the CSV imports plug-in, you can input all your information in Excel, then export a CSV file into Omeka.  The only drawback is that since your values are separated by commas (hence Comma Separate Values!), any commas that are in cells such as Item Description will need to be treated specially.  This page will help you out if you choose to use this handy plug-in.

Now if you will excuse me, History Iguana needs to go sun.

...that plug-ins are a way to customize your Omeka.net site!

There are nine plug-in available at Omeka.net.  For a previous site I built for Special Collections, I used three:  Exhibit Builder (obviously!), Simple Pages, and Social Bookmarking.  Within the context of this course, Social Bookmarking is one of the better plug-ins.  I've used it myself to post items from an exhibit.

For the Plaza-Midwood neighborhood exhibit, this will be really great to spread the word about what we've found or have to say about PM's evolution.  Spreading the word has never been easier!

You can (somewhat) control where visitors share your information.  As you can see from the screenshot above, I chose Facebook, Twitter, Google, and Yahoo.  (Myspace...  Snort!)  I've never even heard of half of these.  Is there any social media sites on this list that you use?

...she's surprised how much some websites have changed... or not changed.

I do a lot of genealogical research...  Well, when I have the time, which is not really right now.  One valuable resource is Ancestry.com.

August 30, 2012

I use it at the uptown library occasionally (it's free there).  But I only started referring to it back in about 2008.  Here's what it looked like then.

January 1, 2008

Overall, it's not too different.  The user-interface is quite similar (one reason I don't use it for my family tree, but that's another story).  The 2012 version is much sleeker and inviting, though.  

But let's look at it circa 1996:

...look at the really bad postcards!

And these are from my own collection!  Check out some at this tumblr:  http://bad-postcards.tumblr.com/.

...What is digital history?

Before reading:

Digital history is the dissemination and exhibition of historical information through electronic means.  This includes TV and other forms of video production, websites and articles, blogs, radio, and social media postings.  In the last decade, digital history usage has exploded thanks to the Internet, especially due to high-speed accessibility and smartphones.  Digital history implies that history also has a permanent presentation, since pretty much everything posted on the Internet is, frankly, there forever.

So what do I have to add to this after the readings?

I have a few random thoughts.

Notice how I highlighted that last word.  What you put on the Internet, stays on the Internet.  I can only imagine if Facebook were around a few years earlier...  But I digress.  As far as the digital dissemination of history, is this a bad thing?  I think not. 

But there is a TON of information available out there.  The greatest challenge to the navigating all that stuff out there, I believe, is critical thinking.  Although Wikipedia may be completely slammed by academia as a resource, its presence, along with a healthy dose of skepticism, makes you really think about what's in those articles and if they're true/correct or not. 

We're putting more and more information on the web.  Now we need to present it in forms suitable for certain types of media--i.e. smart phones and tablets rather than just desktops.  In the last few years, information has become not only instantly available both temporally and spatially.  We can have it when we want it and where we want it (provided you don't have AT&T and are in Garinger, haha). 

I'd like to see, personally, if the currently available forms of social media will satisfy this requirement of right here, right now.  So here goes my immersion into digital history.

...researching Plaza-Midwood is going to be fun!

Here's a brief bit of history about PM:

Plaza-Midwood neighborhood is comprised of some of Charlotte's streetcar suburbs.  In 1914, Paul Chatham began development of a residential area similar to E.D. Latta's Dilworth, the original streetcar development.  Named Chatham Estates, large lots for spacious houses were provided along  what is now The Plaza boulevard for streetcar and automobile service.  Later developments would be added, such as Midwood.  The area also included a commercial strip down Central Avenue once considered the "Miracle Mile" of Charlotte shopping destinations.

However, post-WWII residential and commercial development emphasized new, modern amenities and transportation focused on the automobile.  Like many older urban neighborhoods, Midwood and its surrounding areas steadily deteriorated until the 1970s, when concerned citizens came together to revitalize their diverse, historic area.  Rebranding the neighborhood as Plaza-Midwood, they worked to improve city services and bring new business as well as aid older and less-fortunate neighbors in maintaining their property.

Today, Plaza-Midwood is one of the more desirable and diverse neighborhoods in Charlotte.

Links:
Plaza-Midwood Neighborhood Association
Plaza-Midwood neighborhood survey by Tom Hanchett
Walking tour of the neighborhood
Map of Plaza-Midwood National Historic District

Local Landmarks in Plaza-Midwood:
Bishop John C. Kilgo House (1914)
Newcombe-McElwee House (1935)
Victor Shaw House (ca. 1928)
Van Landingham Estate (1914)
Victoria (1895)

...here is my first post.

That is all.  For now.