It’s the citation problem and its relationship to “usage patterns” that I want to focus on here. In the American Council of Learned Societies’ report on Cyberinfrastructure for the Humanities and Social Sciences, the authors identify “citation systems” as one essential element of a robust cyberinfrastructure, in part because of the role they play in information retrieval (6). Likewise, the University of Maryland’s online guide to citation systems and style manuals includes this statement about why referencing sources is important:
Proper citation allows others to locate the materials you used. This allows interested readers to expand their knowledge on a topic. In some disciplines, one of the most effective strategies for locating authoritative relevant sources is to follow footnotes or references from known valuable sources.
Despite their importance, however, the citation conventions we’ve evolved for print resources are often inadequate for electronic resources. This is not, strictly speaking, a citation problem; it is an information services problem. Moreover, it is a problem that is especially acute in the arts and humanities, where we deal with aesthetic objects whose experimental nature often makes them difficult to classify and document. For example, The MLA style manual–the manual of record for arts and humanities scholars–offers no guidance on how to cite a variety of emerging creative genres that are native to the WWW: how, for instance, would you cite a machinima production? Harry Potter fan fiction? A “mixed reality” art work, such as Filthy Fluno’s Sintetika, which exists both as a virtual painting in Second Life, and a limited edition print in Real Life? A YouTube mashup? A transmedia novel, such as Cathy’s Book, that tells a story across multiple media? If such works are essentially un-citable using existing citation standards, then they risk becoming invisible because they cannot easily circulate within scholarly communication channels. (more…)
]]>There’s lots going on around us, though, and so I’ll use some of this downtime to point toward important work on digital scholarship around the web. Today, I want to point to the Summer 2008 issue of Kairos, guest edited by Scott Lloyd DeWitt and Cheryl Ball, entitled “The Manifesto Issue.” The manifesto as a form is near and dear to my heart, and particularly those that have to do with new media composition and publishing, so I was thrilled to find a reference to MediaCommons in Catherine C. Braun and Kenneth L. Gilbert’s fantastic video, “This Is Scholarship,” which should be required viewing for every tenure and promotion committee. The entire issue, however, is filled with compelling pieces that do not simply make arguments on behalf of new digital modalities but that enact those arguments in their form as well. This, indeed, is the most important kind of scholarship, both rigorous and experimental, clearing the way for others to follow.
]]>This week’s In Media Res line-up:
Monday, May 5, 2008 – Raiford Guins (State University of New York, Stony Brook) presents: “Mint on Card (MOC)”
Tuesday, May 6, 2008 – Caryn Murphy (University of Wisconsin, Madison) presents: “‘She’d Like to Be a Veterinarian’: Parents, Parent Companies, and the Princess Movement”
Wednesday, May 7, 2008 – Henry Jenkins (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) presents: “‘Sometimes My Kids Seem Like a Bunch of Kangaroos!’”
Thursday, May 8, 2008 – Derek Johnson (University of Wisconsin, Madison) presents: ” “‘The Legend of G.I. Joe…New from Marvel Comics!’: The Toy as Comic Book on Television”
Friday, May 9, 2008 – Avi Santo (Old Dominion University) presents: “‘Save Me Captain Stubing! Skeletor and The Lone Ranger have joined forces and are attacking the General Lee’: The place of play in building story-worlds”
]]>CALL FOR PROPOSALS
SCHOLARLY MULTIMEDIA USING SOPHIE
Deadline for proposals: May 12, 2008
The Institute for Multimedia Literacy is pleased to announce a workshop for faculty and graduate students to create multimedia projects with Sophie, an easy-to-use free software application developed by the Institute for the Future of the Book and presented by USC’s School of Cinematic Arts. Sophie allows users to design interactive texts that incorporate images, video and sound, and it deploys creative formats for analysis, annotation and citation.
Participants will engage in a hands-on workshop May 27 – 30, 2008, with the goal of creating a scholarly project; they will then be free to use the IML labs with support staff during the summer to continue work on the project; and they will be invited to present their completed projects at a showcase event in August. Participants will receive an honorarium of $1,000 for their participation in the workshop.
Sophie is described by the Institute for the Future of the Book as “software for writing and reading rich media documents in a networked environment.” Sophie’s goal is to encourage multimedia authoring and, in the process, “to redefine the notion of a book or ‘academic paper’ to include both rich media and mechanisms for reader feedback and conversation in dynamic margins.”
Successful proposals will be based on an existing paper or body of research; they will articulate how media elements will enhance or transform the paper; and they will indicate a desire to dedicate a full week to the project during the workshop.
Those interested are invited to submit a proposal that includes the following:
Name and affiliation
Paper/project title and brief description
Sophie project description: what do you imagine doing with Sophie?
Why is this an interesting project to translate into an interactive, media-rich, extensible and/or networked format?
What assets (images, video, sound) do you have ready to use?
Please submit proposals by email to Holly Willis, Director of Academic Programs, Institute for Multimedia Literacy hwillis@cinema.usc.edu
Deadline for proposals is 5:00 p.m., Monday, May 12, 2008. Participants will be notified on Friday, May 16, 2008. Questions? Holly Willis: 213-743-2937.
About the Institute for Multimedia Literacy: The IML is an organized research unit within USC’s School of Cinematic Arts dedicated to developing educational programs and conducting research on the changing nature of literacy in a networked culture. The IML’s educational programs promote effective and expressive communication and scholarly production through the use of multiple media applications and tools. The IML also supports faculty research that seeks to transform discipline-based scholarship. http://iml.usc.edu
]]>This week’s In Media Res line-up:
Monday, April 28, 2008 – Shilpa Dave (Brandeis University) presents: “Speaking American: Cultural Expressions of Race and Nationality in Harold and Kumar”
Tuesday, April 29, 2008 – L.S. Kim (University of California, Santa Cruz) presents: “Music is the international language ~ and Asians Can Dance”
Wednesday, April 30, 2008 – Jane Park (University of Sydney) presents: “(Asian American?) Hip Hop: Cool Calm Pete’s ‘Black Friday’”
Thursday, May 1, 2008 – Shalini Shankar (Northwestern University) presents: “‘Barack O¹Bollywood’: Black-Asian Connections on the Viral Video Campaign Trail”
Friday, May 2, 2008 – LeiLani Nishime (Sonoma State University) presents: “From Lovebot to War Bride: Race, Family, and Citizenship in Battlestar Galactica”
]]>This week’s In Media Res line-up:
Monday, April 21, 2008 – Ben Aslinger (University of Wisconsin, Madison) presents: “‘Jumping Your Bones Was Extremely Atypical For Me’: Brothers and Sisters, Queer Hollywood Labor, and Textual Possibilities in a Post-Network Era”
Tuesday, April 22, 2008 – Kelly Kessler (Rutgers University) presents: “Where Does a Girl Have to Go to Find a Pool Table: Gender Performance, Leisure, and The L Word in Second Life”
Wednesday, April 23, 2008 – Hollis Griffin (Northwestern University) presents: “Television’s New Publics and Privates: From Mobile Privatization to Trans-Spatial Publicity?”
Thursday, April 24, 2008 – Sreya Mitra (University of Wisconsin, Madison) presents: “Yaari, men in drag, and gays: tracing the changing dynamics of queer male sexuality in popular Hindi cinema”
Friday, April 25, 2008 – Craig O. Stewart (Old Dominion University) presents: “I don’t think anyone has an obligation to do anything”: The pop politics of coming out”
]]>This week’s In Media Res line-up:
Monday, April 14, 2008 – Madhavi Mallapragada (University of Texas at Austin) presents: “Show me the Money: Desi TV in the US Marketplace”
Tuesday, April 15, 2008 – Robert Tynes (University at Albany) presents: ” Africa is mine, the diaspora is mine”
Wednesday, April 16, 2008(a) – Rajinder Dudrah (University of Manchester) presents: “British Bhangra Album Sleeves as Artwork”
Wednesday, April 16, 2008(b) – Ashwani Sharma (University of East London) presents: “Britz: Muslims and Postmodern Media after 9/11”
Thursday, April 17, 2008 – Ola Ogunyemi (University of Lincoln) presents: “No place for cultural taboo in Cyberspace”
Friday, April 18, 2008 – Jigna Desai (University of Minnesota) presents: “Hmong Bollywood”
]]>This week’s In Media Res line-up:
Monday, April 7, 2008 – Olivier Tchouaffe (University of Texas at Austin) presents: “Bamako”
Tuesday, April 8, 2008 – Brian Larkin (Barnard College) presents: “Projecting Nigeria”
Wednesday, April 9, 2008 – Jude Akudinobi (University of California, Santa Barbara) presents: “Charade, Masquerade and Hollywood’s Africa”
Thursday, April 10, 2008 – Ibrahim Amidou (University of Cincinnati) presents: “Generational Clashes in the Retold Epic Story of “Kéita! The Heritage of the Griot” (1995) by Dani Kouyaté”
Friday, April 11, 2008 – Sada Niang (University of Victoria) presents: “Colonial migrations in Sembene’s La noire de…”
]]>This week’s In Media Res line-up:
Monday, March 31, 2008 – Joshua Green (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) presents: “Where it Belongs: Positioning US dramas on Australian TV”
Tuesday, April 1, 2008 – Maeve Connolly (Dun Laoghaire Institute of Art, Design & Technology) presents: “Close Encounters of the Fourth Kind”
Wednesday, April 2, 2008 – Aswin Punathambekar (University of Michigan) presents: “A family drama: Television and the fight for the national family”
Thursday, April 3, 2008 – Miranda Banks (University of Southern California) presents: “Oh, What a Primetime Party: The Night is Young on the WB”
Friday, April 4, 2008 – Stephen Harrington (Queensland University of Technology) presents: “Our Newsreaders “Love You, Queensland”, Please Reciprocate”
Please check out these wonderful contributions and offer your thoughts via a comment.
]]>Our friends at the Institute for the Future of the Book have today announced their new institutional partnership with New York University (which NYU likewise announced recently).
Happily, the first fruits of this partnership directly benefit MediaCommons; working with the NYU digital library team, we have received an NEH Digital Startup Grant that will enable us to build the social networking backend for the fully-functional MediaCommons network we’ve been planning.
As Ben notes at if:book, we’re all enormously excited, and we’ll be looking forward to announcing more such developments in the future.
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