Digital History: Methods and Perspectives (21 October, 4 and 9 November 2016) A Block-Seminar of the Department of History and Civilization organized together with the EUI Library and the Historical Archives of the European Union Conveners: Prof. Alexander Etkind and Dr. Serge Noiret

1. What is Digital Public History?
Teaching and Practice
Enrica Salvatori - Laboratorio di Cultura Digitale - Pisa
Digital History: methods and perspectives
(Firenze EUI 21 october 2016)

2. Digital History at Infouma
• Since 2010 course of Digital History at the Master Degree course
in Digital Humanities (Informatica Umanistica form here IU) in
Pisa
• Since 2016 (NOW) course of Digital Public History in the same
Master Degree course
• Students not expert or educated in History (only one course during
BA) and students with BA in Humanities
• Digital History ≠ Public History but
PH needs DH & DH is a PH (almost always)

3. DH Skills (base, use of)
Word Processor
Spreadsheet
Image Formats
Sharing Platform
Audio & Video Formats
Social Network
Backend CMS (wordpress)
Database (base!)
Bibliographic Sofware (es.
Zotero)
PH Skills (base)
Macro Periodization in History
Methodology (base)
Reading and Interpreting a
source
Researching and Collecting a
Bibliography
Professional Writing
Geography
Humanities

4. • 50% Theory (home made
texts and slides)
• 50% Lab building the
conceptual structure of the
App
• EXTRA but NOT
OPTIONAL free course
on App organized by IU
Degree Course
First year: building an
App (about History)

6. DH Skills (advanced)
Graphics
Audio / Video
(GIS)
Web Design
App Design
PH Skills (advanced)
History and historical
method (full)
Multimedia
Communication
Marketing
Professional writing

7. Second year: Epigraphs
• telling the “story” of an epigraph
(from ancient to contemporary era) using
TEXTS, IMAGES, AUDIO, VIDEO and
structured paths go reading
• make citizenship aware of their history
by “reading again” this “ghosts” and by
collecting them
• 50% theory 50% lab in digital video
production (external aid)
• municipality and school collaboration
requested but not achieved

9. DH Skills (advanced)
Graphics
Audio / Video
GIS
Web Design
Digital Philology
Epidoc?
Database and Datamining
PH Skills (advanced)
History and historical
method (full)
Epigraphy
Multimedia
communication
Professional writing
Management

10. Third and Fourth year:
e-book History of Pisa
• thinking at an ebook as a
real multimedia device;
• reasoning about the best
way to explain and tell
history to readers with
new tools
• 50% theory 50% lab in
writing, recording and
ebook production (with
external aid)

11. DH Skills (advanced)
Graphics
Audio / Video
e-publishing (formats)
e-publishing (platforms)
Sharing Platforms
PH Skills (advanced)
History and historical
method
Multimedia
communication
Professional writing
Management

12. Fifth year:
building a reenactment
• Reenactment of a witch trial during the XVII century in a rural village in Val di
Vara (La Spezia): writing of the plot
• use of primary sources, building of the characters, recording voices,
thinking how to build an event into and out of the web
• interacting with local people by recording interview, sharing contents, arguing
choices
• reasoning about logistic and
economic issues
• municipality interested and
willing to cooperate
• financial aid possible in the next
two years

13. DH Skills (advanced)
Graphics
Web Design
Audio/Video
Web research
Sharing Platform
PH Skills (advanced)
History and historical method
Historical Research
Digital Philology
Multimedia communication
Professional writing
Analyzing and setting the
environment
Teaching and Speaking Ability
Flexibility / Adaptability
Management (STRONG)

14. sixth year:
migrants’ stories
• Audio interviews to young migrants
about their past, culture (history), present,
future
• advanced skill in audio recording and
audio production software
• interacting with migrants and
associations (Ass. Malatesta- Pisa)

15. sixth year:
migrants’ stories
• logistic and ethical issues (permission,
risk of recognition)
• valid data and use of them (collaboration
with a a Master in Statistics)
• strong effort in building good outputs in
term of interviews, publication,
dissemination (format of the audio and web
design and press agency)

16. DH Skills (advanced)
Web Design ?
Audio/Video
Drama
Web Research
Data Visualization
Sharing Platforms
PH Skills (advanced)
History and historical method
Historical Research
Multimedia Communication
Professional Writing
Social Science
Teaching and Speaking
Ability
Flexibility / Adaptability
Management

17. Base and advanced…
Nobody can, in ONE COURSE, to teach how to be a FULL
digital public historian, of course. But the question is how to
do it in a complete BA/MA course degree.
What I have learned during 6 years of practice:
a Digital Public Historian needs more then a superficial
knowledge of the digital world then

18. Base and advanced…
• in the BA degree students should learn the “bases”: word
processor, spreadsheet, image formats, sharing platform, audio &
video formats, social networks, copyright issues, theoretical
foundations and programming, web design and programming,
data bases, statistics, bibliographic software
• in the BA degree student should learn also the bases of
history and historical method (and this is enough!)

19. Base and advanced…
• in the MA degree students should advance their skills choosing
among the more useful and favorite (meaning suited to personal
aptitudes) digital tools, but knowing a little bit of every things
• they cannot be focused on a specific period of time (the
diachronic point of view is compulsory)
• they cannot be focused only on History: (digital) Philology, (digital
Art, (digital) Libraries are also required
• and also they should know something about the recent
innovations: crowdsourcing, born digital sources, open access
issues, sentiment analysis…

20. LAST but not least
in the MA degree students should learn also how to manage a
project, how to deal with public, how to interact with
institutions, how get their hands dirty in the public arena
How we could possibly teach this?
adding traditional courses in management, speaking
skills, social behavior could be useless

21. We need a different
education
• Problem solving methods should be put in the core of the
course degree
• Workgroups should be the basic format of the working method
• A great commitment is needed in training and thanking care
of the groups (tutoring)
• The object of the work should be real (not invented, not
theoretical)
• The course degree should not be the addition of individual courses,
but a shared educational project

22. enrica.salvatori@unipi.it