Focusing on the “Debates in Digital Humanities”I found Part IV Blog Posts – The Social Contract of Scholarly Publishing quite interesting.  This section seems to add another hurdle for the DH – “Can we change the views of humanities scholars so that they may accept, as some legal scholars already do, the great blog post as being as influential as the great law review article?” (pg. 320)

“…perception of value can come from the intrinsic worth of the good itself (e.g., the quality of wine, already rather subjective), it is often influenced by many other factors, such as price and packaging (the wine bottle, how the wine is presented for tasting.”   These elements trigger a reaction based on stereotypes – if it’s expensive and looks well wrapped it must be valuable.”  (pg 320)

“Perception of Value” – if the article/document is not scholarly reviewed, if a website does not end in .edu is it less valuable?

I found this section to be  interesting because as I am expanding my research in the DH field there is an abundance of blogs, twitter accounts, online journals to follow… not the typical scholarly reviewed journals or texts I am used to following in previous studies.  .edu and scholarly reviewed journals are being replaced with WordPress blogs, hashtags, etc – real time conversations – which hold great value to DH studies.  A question I am wondering: does this cause anxiety and question the perception of value to certain scholars in and outside the field presently?   Just wondering your thoughts and if you experience this yourself as a student in a DH class? (especially if you are new to DH and learning from a real-time online environment?)

While reading all this new material offered in this course I find myself constantly defining new terms and persons mentioned throughout the readings.  One in particular Roy Rozenzweig the founding director of Center for History and New Media (CHNM)

I have listed a few links that offer information about the Digital Historian, Roy Rozenzweig and his accomplishment.

The last link will lead you to the Center for History and New Media – Tools and Research Section.

http://thanksroy.org/about

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/12/AR2007101202489.html

http://chnm.gmu.edu/research-and-tools/

From CHNM About Section:

Since 1994 under the founding direction of Roy Rosenzweig, the Center for History and New Media (CHNM) at George Mason University has used digital media and computer technology to democratize history—to incorporate multiple voices, reach diverse audiences, and encourage popular participation in presenting and preserving the past. The center itself is a democratic, collaborative space where over fifty scholars, technologists, and researchers work together to advance the state of the art.

CHNM uses digital media and technology to preserve and present history online, transform scholarship across the humanities, and advance historical education and understanding. Each year CHNM’s many project websites receive over 20 million visitors, and over a million people rely on its digital tools to teach, learn, and conduct research.

CHNM’s work has been recognized with major awards and grants from the American Historical Association, the National Humanities Center, the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Department of Education, the Library of Congress, the Institute of Museum and Library Services, the American Council of Learned Societies, and the Mellon, Sloan, Hewlett, Rockefeller, Gould, Delmas, and Kellogg foundations.