Subscribing to internet blogs, newsletters and groups

Rethinking Afghanistan on facebook

Signing up to facebook groups, internet blogs and magazines, suggested by Mike as part of our Digital History course, has been very helpful to my research for my dissertation. The last section of my paper will cover the legacy of the Iranian Revolution and the hostage crisis for US – Iranian relations. Although I have been aware of and consulted the websites of the International Crisis Group and Amnesty International in the past, I have now signed up to the newsletters and blogs of a number of journals, magazines and blogs. This means the information comes to me via my email or facebook page rather than I needing to seek it out. I receive updates, reports and snippets of articles from The International Crisis Group, Foreign Policy Magazine, Enduring America, Rethink Afghanistan, National Security Archives, Foreign Affairs and The Atlantic magazine, The Slate and (just lately) Mother Jones.

Enduring America is a blog almost totally devoted to contemporary political events in Iran. As well as providing its own analysis the blog relays posts from within Iran by members of the ‘Green Movement’ which rejects the results of last year’s Iranian presidential elections and has been involved in organising a protest campaign. Just last week I attended a lecture at UCC by Houchang Chehabi, an Iranian professor of International Relations and History at Boston University, where he highlighted the increasing use of the internet (twitter, facebook, etc) by twentysomethings within Iran to organise, protest and disseminate information. Though some commentators on the situation in Iran have sought to downplay the influence of technology, surely the ability to communicate, especially with some anonymity, is vital for organising demonstrations amongst large groups of individuals and for finding others who share your political or cultural views. It is like downplaying the influence of the printing press on the Reformation!

Zotero and Me

Before Christmas I downloaded Zotero as an add-on to my Firefox browser. I went on to gather a number of sources but then left it for a number of weeks while I worked on other essays. When  I returned to it to do further work I couldn’t find it on my browser so went looking for my account on the Zotero website but no joy. I emailed the guys at Zotero who also searched for my account before tactfully suggesting that maybe I had just downloaded Zotero but never registered online and synced my stuff! Unfortunately, they were dead right! I had downloaded Zotero but when I got rid of my old laptop my Zotero and Firefox went with it. Anyway, a little wiser, I began again. This time I registered online too so hopefully I can access my Zotero files from any computer though I haven’t tried that yet. I am still trying to get used to saving things to Zotero instead of bookmarking them but am getting better.

I recently downloaded a Zotero add-on for Microsoft Word for generating footnotes and bibliographys. Above is an example of a bibliography I generated using this. Actually creating a bibliography made me realise how very useful the programme is so I look forward to a long and happy relationship!

Reflections on Cohen & Rosenzweig’s “Digital History”

I quickly browsed over this book at the start of our course. However, I decided to reread it now I have done a fair bit of work on my blog and feel I have a better grasp of the differing possibilities of using digital resources for history. In the introduction the authors discuss the different visions of the future, both positive and negative, which academics had for the impending digital age (this was in 1993). While enthusiasts envisioned a virtual learning environment without classrooms and books as a positive development, sceptics bemoaned a future where libraries would be defunct. However, as usual, the future did not turn out as predicted. When I was a kid we thought the future would be filled with flying cars and Star Trek like clothes. Instead we got mobile phones, ipods and a world of knowledge at our fingertips – different but probably even more amazing! I can live without the flying car but not my phone! I remember my dad saying in the future we would take pills which would supply all the calories and nutrients we needed instead of eating dinner but, of course, this never happened and I don’t think ever will as some of the rituals we humans have developed such as eating dinner together or reading books are too important to us fulfilling more than just a function.

As I read, I reflected on what computers and the internet have meant to me as I did my degree and as I do my masters. Certainly, to paraphrase Cohen and Rosenzweig, my laptop is my pencil. It helps me create quality work by enabling me to redraft and order my scattered thoughts which would be way more tedious on paper. I also have abysmal handwriting but my word processor renders this inconsequential. More important though is the effect of the internet on my research.

Mind Mapping and Learning Styles

I first created a mind map as a second year exercise in history and found them an effective way to plan an essay. Our digital history class discussed their use again last term so I decided to try out one of the free internet programmes, Xmind, and create one for my dissertation. I found using the programme handy as it is easy to go back over areas to add/develop an idea which is more difficult with a hand-drawn map. This also means it is easier to work on the map over the course of a few days rather than all at once. However, I am not sure it engages the creative juices in the same way as the hand-drawn map.

US - Iranian Relations Mind Map

On Wikipedia it says mind maps encourage brainstorming and act as a “graphical method of taking notes” but I tend to use them to provide structure to my plans and order my thoughts as often I get lost following ideas or lines of research which ultimately prove not to warrant such in-depth study. The hierarchical structure that the mind map imposes makes clear the weight of importance due to each idea. Whilst doing my mind map and researching the concept I came across some literature on learning styles and began to reflect on whether I had a learning style and if so what it was. I followed a UCD paper I found on google to Richard Felder’s site. As well as being a professor of Chemical Engineering he also is involved in the National Effective Teaching Institute in the US. On his site a took a test to discern my learning style the results of which I will add below along with my mind map. Although not strongly in any one camp it does show I am more a reflective than active learner and more verbal than visual. Reflective learners like to think thing they learn through to grasp them while active learners prefer to put ideas/concepts/formulas to the test to see how they work and learn this way. Verbal learners gain more from written and spoken explanations while visual learners do better if facts and ideas are expressed in pictures or diagrams.

My Learning Style Results

Even more Evernote…

Following the text analysis by Wordle on President Carter’s inaugural and farewell speeches I decided to run the same two speeches through Tapor – another text analysis tool. Tapor lists the frequency of the words in the text and their distribution throughout the text but strips out frequently used words which do not add much meaning such as and, meanwhile, but etc. This is the so-called ‘Glasgow stop list’ as it was compiled by the Linguistics Department at the University of Glasgow. I only screen-clipped (with Evernote) the top ten words from each speech for comparison and certainly the difference in tone is noticable. In the inaugural speech the words used, like spirit, dream, new and nation, seem more upbeat and idealistic while the top words in the farewell speech  include President, rights, nuclear, difficult which seems more worldly and concrete in tone.

Carter's Inaugural Speech

Carter's Farewell Speech

I found the Tapor text analysis tool very useful. Picking out the frequently used words so quickly and easily from a speech could be really handy for my dissertation as I hope to examine the attitudes as well as actions of the Carter Administration and the US media towards Iran during the Islamic Revolution of 1979. This method could provide a real short-cut for me in doing this.

Using Evernote

Have managed to upload a number of pics to my Evernote account but only recently realised that you had to download the application too to gain maximum benefit! (thanks Mike) So now I can clip images or text to store it on Evernote too. I created a couple of Wordles which are really cute ‘word clouds’ made from uploaded text. The most-used words in the text appear larger and the program can present the text in different fonts, colours and directions. I created my two from President Jimmy Carter’s inaugural and farewell speeches to see if there was a contrast in the focus of his attention. Hopefully, I will attach the two of them below…

My Community of Practice

Following Mike’s lecture/discussion on ‘communities of practice’ I signed up to email alerts and Facebook pages in the area I am doing my MA in – US foreign policy and Iran. ‘Enduring America’ is a blog by W. Scott Lucas, a professor of American history particularly foreign policy in Birmingham, England. The blog is mainly concerned with current political events in Iran. As the ‘western’ press has little access to information from Iran due to the current regime’s repressive nature this blog is an invaluable source of news on internal Iranian affairs. I was told about this blog by my dissertation supervisor, Dr. David Ryan, and initially I was taking a glance at it whenever I remembered.  I then signed up for email alerts and now updates are sent to my email address each day.  I also get email updates from the ‘International Crisis Group’. This organisation was founded in 1995 and seeks to provide independent, non-partisan advice and information to governments and international bodies in the form of detailed well-researched reports on crisis situations around the world. On Facebook I joined the ‘National Security Archives’ (NSA) page. The NSA is an independent research institute located at the George Washington University in the US. Its mission is to ‘broaden access to the historical record’ by sourcing and gathering information often by pursuing Freedom of Information lawsuits. The NSA sends me updates on any new information released to my Facebook page so I can easily assess whether it is relevant to my studies.

These alerts and updates have made it easier for me to keep up in research areas I am interested in and they come to me rather than I having to remember to regularly seek them out. In his lecture Mike spoke of how people learn through communities of practice akin to apprenticeships. Initially the learner stays on the periphery observing and assimilating skills and information before gradually moving towards the centre. Etainne Wenger defines communities of practice as ‘groups of people who share a concern or a passion for something they do and learn how to do it better as they interact regularly.’ However, I feel I am still only comfortable on the periphery and not yet confident to interact or add my voice to blogs or similar yet (other than this one!).

Historic restaurant tour of Cork

The following photos are of Cork city restaurants located in historic buildings. I did this photo tour as part of the digital history course and after much fiddling about managed to edit and upload the photos to the blog and to evernote.

US foreign policy research

For my module essay I am going to look at the documents on US propaganda efforts in the Middle East in the 1950s.  The National Security Archives has a electronic sourcebook on its website with over a hundred documents related to this. Mostly telegrams from diplomatic staff in the Middle East to the State Department and vice versa. I would like to get some actual photos of the various pamphlets, books etc discussed also to have a look but that may prove difficult.

1911 Census Exercise

This week Mike asked us to transfer data from the 1911 Census of Ireland into an Excel sheet. The complete census is now available and searchable online at www.census.nationalarchives.ie

The section we are processing is in the parish of Ballymodan which is about 20 miles west of Cork City.
I did the 6 households that I was assigned this morning and although inputting the data is hardly riveting stuff the information contained was interesting. Especially the fact that out of 27 people only one spoke Irish! At that time Ireland was still under British rule so I guess that Irish was not taught in schools but am not sure. The majority of adults and school-age children could read and write. Only 4 adults out of the group could not. I found it interesting that one of the ancillary census forms about the types of dwellings wished the enumerator to list how many windows each house had at the front. I have heard it said there was a window tax in place in Ireland at one stage but will have to research further to discover whether this was the reason for counting windows.
When I was finished I searched through the census to see if I could find my maternal grandparents, Margaret O’Reilly and Timothy McCarthy, from Bantry. I found both their census returns which was amazing to see. They were both 17 years in 1911 and lived down the road from one another in Chapel Street in Bantry. The quality of the image below is not great but my grandmother is the last entry. Her mother remarried following the death of her husband which is why some of the family are listed as Howards while my granny and her brother, Joe, are O’Reillys.

My Grandmother's Census Return