So there's this film someone posted on You Tube in 2010
Art, politics, medicine, movies: this is the sort of source that brings the past alive in all its power and complexity. It's the kind of thing researchers would love to explore and teachers and students would love to use–indeed, already are using–in today's classrooms. But there's a catch.
Like millions of other new historical sources now available on the Internet, we don't know enough about this film to really use it in scholarship, teaching, or public history. Who made this source, when, why–and for what audience? Is this digital copy authentic, has it been edited? Where is the original now, who owns it–how can we use it or cite it? Will it be there tomorrow?
That's where SourceLab, a student-led digital publishing initiative established by the Department of History at Illinois, comes in. We make reliable, critical, free editions of web-based material, reclaiming the best the Internet has to offer for history teaching and research. More than that, we're building basic bibliographical and editorial skills–along with newer, digital publishing techniques–back into undergraduate education.
To learn more:
