This introductory class on DPH has been eye-opening, at times a bit overwhelming, and overall enjoyable. In many ways, I wasn’t sure what to expect from the class and my goals were rather low-bar: know more than I did when I began and hopefully enough to be able to do some self-guided learning. I believe I did that. I like to tell my own students that if you leave class with more questions than you came in with, that is a good thing.

I believe my definition of DPH remains fairly the same as it was in the beginning. I still very much believe it has to be a collaborative project. Even though I did the work on my own, I never would have been able to get where I am without Dr. Mullen’s help, and I got a lot out of my classmates comments. Moreover, the introduction of work in various parts of DH shows how scholars from different backgrounds have come together to create the technology, methods, research, interpretations, etc. No one person could achieve this work on their own. It’s also interesting to see that while most traditional works of history scholarship are created by individual scholars, many DH projects have a several individuals contributing.

I do have a better understanding now of the “big umbrella” idea of DPH and some of the problems with that. Are digital archive collections governed by the same rules and methods as networking projects? Is the former really an extension of archive management and something separate from a project like Orbis or podcasts? With so many digital approaches to archiving, researching, and disseminating knowledge it seems that maybe the umbrella has gotten too large to do its job. it’s an interesting question to pay attention to as I continue with this program.

While I learned quite a bit about digitizing collections, metadata, and copyright as ways of presenting mostly primary source material for the use of researchers, I was most interested about the technologies used to research and disseminate findings. I love maps. I have always loved maps. I torment my students daily with maps. I really enjoyed the mapping tools we worked with. I used kepler for my final project, but I am still a novice at best. I have to sit and think about how best to use this tool. As was reinforced throughout the class readings, the technology is a tool and does not replace having to create a sound methodology based on good questions. I have to consider methodology and the questions such tools could help with. Network analysis was totally new to me, and I look forward to exploring that method more.

I leave this class now mostly with the question of how do I limit myself with the options available. I have a big interest in mapping, network analysis, and podcasting. My institution is also in the process of hiring a new librarian who would be a part-time, and our only, archivist with an advisory board to help. I will be on that board. How much of digital practice do I bring in there? I found the class readings and videos particularly helpful in asking questions of how to decide what one may want to or should digitize in an archive, even though this is not my main interest. I also need to ask how much of this could/should I try to bring into my own classes. I’ve seen some really interesting collaborative work with students that has given me some ideas with my own classes. There are many possibilities under that big umbrella, and I need to find the part where I belong.