Many of this week’s reading cycled around the question of how digital historians could justify themselves both with an identity and to define where in the field of history there can be a space for digital humanities. To be perfectly honest, I’ve had a very difficult time since the beginning of this course understanding why there is even confusion in the first place about some of the aspects of what William G. Thomas called the ‘cyberargument.’

However, some of the readings this week helped me hone in on what I think is the underlying issue between those who do not embrace digital history and those who do. I think that the key here is separating what Ayers called “closed narratives” and “open narratives” in historical research.  It seems based on a lot of what I’ve heard in class and a lot of what I read from other people’s reactions that the reason most historians still struggle to define digital history or understand if it’s possible as a career field- which I wholly believe that it is- is because of one of two reasons: 1. They still view historical research only in the sense that you compile evidence to support your argument, and any contradictory evidence must be somehow be argued so that your theory seems the most plausible. 2. They do not welcome change because they cannot predict it.

I think the reason Ayers has received so much recognition and credit for his study in digital history is because he does not let these two limitations restrict the possibilities for digital media in history. He has consistently advocated the need to use digital media in its many changing mediums to engage the public, not to initiate more conversation strictly amongst scholars.

This point struck me admittedly before I finished all of the reading for this week due to a conversation I had with a friend outside history academia. My friend is studying computer programming. After reading last week the point that many digital historians say that they are interested in digital media but do not study coding, I asked him if there was a good place to study coding at its absolute most basic beginner level. He asked what kind of coding and programming I was interested in. I had no way of explaining myself so I just started rambling about the different projects discussed in last week’s class with RICHES and Beyond the Valley of the Shadow, etc. His response was, “that sounds cool but not something I’d be interested in.” What? How can you NOT be interested in these things? I realized that his view on history was like my view on coding. I think many humanities professions forget that just because our jargon and research may not come across to us as being as technical or foreign as other areas of study, that doesn’t mean we can operate our research solely on the academia level without taking the time to break down the basics in order to engage the public as well.

When historians use digital media and public history solely to support their research by collecting artifacts from the public or through community service initiates to engage the public for artifacts, they are failing to teach the lessons from these projects at the same time, I feel. Instead of taking all of these things, archiving them in a massive catalogue for researchers to refer to and then calling the project done, why not seek out ways to take these projects and further them by then presenting them to the public in an engaging manner? For instance, the home movies project with RICHES that wants to collect the home movies and archive them for historical significance? Wouldn’t it be more engaging and beneficial to stream some of the movies covering the same events in a larger video- laying the images back to back to show different perspectives of the same moments in history- and show this video in a public theater for low admission? Then possibly have a panel of historians/experts/participants engage in a verbal conversation afterwards? I realize the argument here is that would take extra money, but it also presents the possibility to earn some money back for furthering the initiative. And it engages the community on a level beyond that of just donation.

The last thing I wanted to talk about was an example I think of a project that integrates digital media and public history. I mentioned them before, and this week I went back in the archive for a public history initiative I found on tumblr called the Douglas Cardinal Project.  The project was three graduate students and one assistant archiving a collection of 344 boxes of documents from famous architect Douglas Cardinal on his various projects and correspondence. I think the reason this example has really intrigued me is because the students have done such an excellent job with making their findings and posts relevant to those who, like myself, have little grounding in the subject of architecture. The fact I can watch the video interviews with Cardinal where he discussed his thought process on building designs, then show the models and actual buildings helps me understand a lot more. More than that, though, it makes me curious to learn more about Cardinal, his works and his archive. The project seems like it has a lot of potential, and I think it wonderfully illustrates how simple it is to initiate conversation between scholars and public on subjects by utilizing multiple mediums at once to break down basic concepts and also elaborate on new findings as well.

At the end of the day, I think whether historians want to argue the multiple “what ifs” of the future of digital history to no end, there are examples of projects and questions in history that are popping up every day and being solved through the integration of digital media. However, it needs to be collectively accepted by the historical community that in order to fully engage the public, we need to encourage the open narratives of history perhaps even as a stepping stone to closed narratives in order to gain the recognition necessary.