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• 1 2015-07-14T08:06:37-07:00 Introduction: Has this Ever Happened to You? 73 text 2015-07-16T17:41:15-07:00 So there's this film someone posted on YouTube in 2010. By the summer of 2015, over 71,000 people had watched it. The video appears to be haunting, archival footage–a documentary? a newsreel?–of work in a Parisian studio, circa 1918.  But this is no ordinary studio.  Instead of making busts of famous poets or rich patrons, the artists are sculpting new faces for soldiers gruesomely mutilated by World War I. Art, medicine, war, movies: this is the sort of source that makes connections, that shows the lived past in all its power and complexity.  It's the kind of thing anyone who wants to explore real history would find meaningful: from classroom teachers to specialist researchers to the public at large.  But there's a catch. Like millions of other digitized historical artifacts 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 document, 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? In the Fall of 2014, students, faculty and staff at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign began to imagine a new, student-centered model of publishing, that would help higher education address this basic flaw in how historical artifacts are often presented on the Internet.  Called SourceLab, this initiative seeks to train students to create reliable, critical, free editions of previously digitized material, preparing the Internet's new historical records for classroom use and research.  Along the way, we're learning how to build basic bibliographical and editorial skills–along with newer, digital publishing techniques–back into history education, with benefits for our students both before and after graduation. This online brochure describes some of the ideas of behind this initiative, currently under development.  We'd love to hear your thoughts, ideas and suggestions for possible collaboration.  To learn more, follow the path below. 
• 1 2015-07-14T15:06:03-07:00 More about its Niche: How Does this Differ from Other Digital Publishing Initiatives? 26 text 2015-07-20T14:49:14-07:00 Obviously, there are many other people trying to prepare the Web for history.  Digital publishing has been developing for decades, reaching incredible scale with such mass digitization projects as Hathi Trust, Google Books, and Eighteenth Century Collections Online.  Thanks to long-term initiatives such as the Internet History Sourcebooks Project and Digital History, online versions of historical sources are now integrated throughout US history teaching, in high schools, colleges, and universities.  For-profit media companies such as Pearson respond to teacher demand by integrating such digital material into the textbooks they sell; the Open Educational Resource movement features them in its freely-distributed curricula. All the same, it seems that an initiative such as SourceLab could occupy a distinctive niche within this rapidly evolving publishing world. First, we aren't a mass digitization initiative (though we're very grateful to them).  Our focus isn't on bringing large amounts of new material onto the Internet.  Instead, we hope to make fascinating materials already digitized by others fully 'good to go' for historical work.  We'll be building our 'editions,' in essence, as frames around a digital object that has already gone online: something people want to use for history, but aren't yet sure how. Second, our editions will be built with this specific purpose in mind.  Since our goal isn't just to 'get it out there,' making it accessible in any old format isn't enough.  We'll provide readers with basic information and scholarly commentary about the artifact, clarifying its origins, evolution, meaning over time and current location. We'll establish its copyright status, and provide guidance as to how it should be cited in both teaching and research.  We'll also put it into formats that make it easier to use and study.  Want a paper copy of the edition to print off, or prefer to read it on an e-reader or tablet? We'll get you covered.  Think an audio-text recording of the original poem would help your students understand its artistry?  We're learning how to make audio-files, as well, using platforms such as Librivox.  In short, we want our editions to actively help people who want think about history, in addition to providing them raw material to work with. Finally, and most importantly, SourceLab is distinguished by its ambition to draw students into the process of preparing Internet resources for teaching and research.  The idea isn't to build a new publishing house or non-profit center, but to make the edition of historical sources a part of history education once again, to the benefit of both students and society alike.