A Paper Delivered at the 10th European Social Science History Conference at the University of Vienna, 24 April 2014. Accompanying Paper Can Be Read at http://mhbeals.com/multimodal/

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Scissors & Paste, Edges & Notes:
Scottish Newspaper Networks, 1780-1840
M. H. Beals
Sheffield Hallam University

2. Proliferation of Colonial and Provincial Presses
• Spread of Journeyman Printers
• Reduction of Stamp Duty
New Profit Models
• Entertaining Content and Advertisements to Attract Readers to Sell to Advertisers
Manual Dissemination of News
• Postal Exchange, Subscriptions, Correspondence
• No Telegraph until 1840s; Not Used for Miscellany
NETWORK NEWS, GEORGIAN STYLE

3. Rising Interest in Media History and
the History of the Provincial Press
Large-Scale Digitisation Project
Growing Number of Early Careerists
Advent of Crowdsourcing
WHY NOW?

4. Identifying
•Datelines (Source)
•Sections (Topic / Source)
•Attributions (Source)
•In-Text References (Topic / Source)
Creating Meta-Data Networks
•Institutional Sources
•Individual Sources
•Geographic Sources
TEXTUAL CLUES

5. INTER-TEXTUAL CLUES

6. Printed (No MRT) Digital (MRT)
Cataloging /
Limited Networks
Creation of Metadata
Regarding Article
Characteristics and
Network Clues
Hunt for Specific Articles
Based on Search Criteria to
Create Case-Study
Networks
Transcriptions /
Scissors-and-Paste Networks
Create Detailed
Transcriptions with Relevant
Typesetting Metadata
Correct OCR Data Manually
or Through Replacement
Protocols
A MULTIMODAL APPROACH

7. </item>
<id>001569</id>
<newspaper_title>Glasgow Advertiser</newspaper_title>
<newspaper_city>Glasgow</newspaper_city>
<newspaper_province>Scotland</newspaper_province>
<newspaper_country>United Kingdom</newspaper_country>
<year>1794</year>
<month>2</month>
<day>7</day>
<page_number>5</page_number>
<section_name>London</section_name>
<articletype>news</articletype>
<keywords>Quakerism</keywords>
<text>
<page>
<column>
<paragraph>
<line>The Quakers of America have addressed an</line>
<line>humble Representation to the Legislative Body of</line>
<line>that country, praying that exhibitions, Preludes,</line>
<line>Interludes, yea, all <italics>lewds</italics> and stage-plays may be</line>
<line>discountenanced, pointing out their pernicious ten-</line>
<line>dency in corrupting the morals of the People.</line>
</paragraph>
</column>
</page>
</text>
</item>
MACHINE READABLE
TRANSCRIPTIONS

8. • Identifying Likely Matches
• Off-the-Shelf Software (Turn-it-In / WCopyFind / Juxta)
• Matching Phrases and Grammatical Structures
• Building Up Directionality Confidences
• Raw Percentage of Matching Text
• Chronological-Geographical Limitations
• Truncation
• Supplementary Text
• Abbreviations
• Mistakes
PROGRAMMING PLAGIARISM

9. SCOTTISH NEWS NETWORKS
(TOPIC)

10. SCOTTISH NEWS NETWORKS
(TEXTUAL)

11. SCOTTISH NEWS NETWORKS
(INTER-TEXTUAL)

12. SCOTTISH NEWS NETWORKS
(INTER-TEXTUAL)

13. High-Level Languages
•Easy to Acquire Syntax
•Variety of Free Editors and a Large Open-Source Community
•(Relatively) Slow
•Support from other Historians (http://programminghistorian.org/)
Low-Level Languages
•(Relatively) Unnatural Syntax
•Faster Processing
•Free and Commercial Editors and Compilers
THE PROGRAMMING HISTORIAN©

14. M. H. Beals
Sheffield Hallam University
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ABOUT ME