Link #5: https://blogs.ubc.ca/sashapassaglia/2020/07/12/task-9-network-assignment/
Task 9: Network Assignment asked us to take the Golden Record Curation data that was added into Palladio, and reflect on the data generation based on the confines of the Palladio platform. This assignment was overwhelming for many reasons, but mostly because of the way that Palladio presents the data with overlapping lines, words, and an endless number of interlinking webs. Let’s just say that I am a list and bar graph kind of person. In this overwhelming web of interconnected data, what stood out to me the most was how “popular” some songs were and how “unpopular” others were. This is what I based my interpretation of the data on.
When scanning through other colleagues’ interpretations of the Golden Record curation data, I was very interested in Sasha’s unique take on this assignment. But, before we get into that, I was happy to hear that I was not the only one initially overwhelmed by the Palladio platform. Sasha’s opening line “Holy interconnected web of confusion, Batman!” immediately hooked me into the post and drew me into reading further.
Sasha creatively looked at the data from a gender lens, which they attribute to their participation in the 565S Summer Institute. I also attended this institute, so I was curious to examine the data from that lens as well. Sasha provides an interesting look at gender’s presence in the Golden Record Curation Assignment, taking the data out of Palladio (which does not include a gender filter), and developing new parameters to interpret the findings. This idea of gender in the data connects to the idea of the individual nature of music, and how each curated list of the Golden Record is so specific and individual to the listener. Because of the unbalanced gendered numbers in Sasha’s section of the course, it was not possible to find any concrete conclusions, but Sasha used her creativity to take the immense amount of data from the Golden Record Curation Assignment out of Palladio and rethink it in their own way.
In my own post for this assignment, I spoke of the importance of “why” and how this is missing from the Palladio data. Sasha also connects to this idea in their post, eloquently talking about the need for qualitative data to supplement and empower the quantitative data that Palladio displays. Sasha states that “Visualization is important, as we can construct meaning from it, however, we need more if what we are looking at doesn’t make sense to us or for the answers we are looking for.” Especially from the lens of the social sciences, we find ourselves always looking for more; more reason, and more answers to the WHY. If we had more in the case of this assignment, it might have been possible to further investigate the data from the gender lens to find correlations and connections.
Sasha’s webspace consists of a simple WordPress design that is supplemented by purposeful and intentional visuals that connect to their thoughts and ideas in the posts. I appreciate the personal nature of the webspace through the inclusion of an “About” page with a supplemental photo. Sasha has chosen to organize her posts in a menu at the top of the webspace chronologically with the most recent posts appearing at the top of the menu. The webspace is filled with different sized and different coloured fonts that highlight and bold ideas that are relevant and important to point out. Overall, I felt there were a lot of personal touches on Sasha’s webspace that made it easy and enjoyable to navigate.