Colored Conventions Review due March 26.
Bring a hardcopy (double spaced, 12pt font)to class. 5% of final grade

For this assignment, write a 500-word summary/review of the Colored Conventions digital exhibition, “a collaborative DH project that brings nineteenth-century Black organizing to digital life.” What does this Omeka site do well? How is it organized? What design features stand out? What plugins does it employ? What would you like to see more of? The purpose of this review is to get you thinking about your own Omeka site. What can you learn from Colored Conventions that you can use in the design of your Indigitization exhibition?

This assignment will be graded on your demonstrated knowledge of Colored Conventions, the detail and accuracy of your summary/review, and the quality of your writing.

Final Omeka Digital Exhibition due April 16. 15% of final grade

For this assignment, using Omeka.net, we will be working with UBC’s Xwi7xwa library to generate a digital exhibition featuring previously uncatalogued photos from their collections. Students will work in groups of five to upload, catalogue, and display photos from the Xwi7xwa collection, using Dublin Core metadata standards.

The Indigitization program provides funding, training, and a growing network to support analog media format digitization in partnership with Indigenous and Aboriginal communities across British Columbia.

Colonial mechanisms threatened Indigenous oral traditions that handed the next generations their knowledge, languages, and cultures. As a result, precious fragments of this knowledge were embedded in magnetic media as a means to preserve it. As decades passed, these open reels, audio cassettes, and other formats became increasingly inaccessible as their physical format became obsolete and at risk for degradation. By transferring content from physical media to digitized files, the voices from the past can again be accessed by current and future generations.

Now, as communities strive to integrate their knowledge into living language and culture, the Indigitization program strives to provide resources for communities to create digital access in ways that are meaningful and appropriate.

Indigitization’s freely available, online Digitization Toolkit has step-by-step digitization processes, digital preservation strategies, and project management worksheet templates. Access the Toolkit and more at Indigitization.ca.

FNIS 401W will be working with the Indigitization team to tag and catalogue a large collection of digital photos, videos, posters, and consent forms. The final product will be a searchable archive an exhibition space for use by Indigitaztion, as well as researchers and community members.

For this project each group will be responsible for:

  • Uploading their assigned photographs.
  • Integrating the metadata standards developed in class for all of the photos in your collection. This includes, standardization of titles and keyword items.
  • Incorporating at least one Omeka plugin.
  • Writing a short introduction to your digital exhibition (500-750 words). Your introduction should include a brief description of the photos in your collection, noting any exciting discoveries or omissions. It should also include an explanation of the plugin(s) you have used. You should conclude with suggestions for further development of the collection and how the collection might be used by researchers and community members.
  • Professionalization of the exhibit. You must ensure that the design of your site is coherent and easy to follow and that your introduction is informative and error-free.

Reflection Paper: For this assignment, each individual group member is also responsible for submitting a 250-500-word reflection on the project. What went well? What didn’t go so well? What are you most proud of in your digital exhibition? What would you have liked to have been stronger? The reflection is also a place where you can share the work flow of your group. Did someone put extra effort into this assignment? Did someone not put in enough effort? These reflections are private and will not be shared with the group. I will be considering them when I determine your grades for the project.

Learning Outcomes: Provide students with hands-on training in digital exhibition using metadata. Give students unique opportunity to work with a previously uncataloged Indigenous collection and to contribute to the preservation and circulation of Indigenous history.