H9808A 2009 03 Open

Return to UWO History 9808A Digital History Fall 2009

“Open source” encapsulates the idea that knowledge should be free, and that people should be able to hack, modify or improve upon existing products. Can we imagine historical work “without owners and with multiple, anonymous authors,” as Rosenzweig puts it? What will that mean for the future of the historian’s craft?

• Canadian Historian Association, "CHA on Copyright," (10 Sep 2009).
  

• Cohen, "Idealism and Pragmatism in the Free Culture Movement," Dan Cohen's Digital Humanities Blog (12 May 2009).
  

• Cohen and Rosenzweig, "Owning the Past," Digital History. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania, 2005.
  

• Graham, "Post-Medium Publishing," Paul Graham (Sep 2009).
  

• Gralla, "Ch 14 How Internet Chat and Instant Messaging Work (Ch 17 7th ed.)", "Ch 16 How Blogging and RSS Work (not in 7th ed.)", "Ch 30 How Wikis and Wikipedia Work (not in 7th ed.)"
  

• Kelty, "Introduction," Two Bits: The Cultural Significance of Free Software. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2008.
  

• Rosenzweig, "The Road to Xanadu: Public and Private Pathways on the History Web," Journal of American History 88, no. 2 (Sep 2001): 548-579.
  

• Rosenzweig, "Should Historical Scholarship Be Free?" AHA Perspectives (Apr 2005).
  

• Rosenzweig, "Can History be Open Source? Wikipedia and the Future of the Past," Journal of American History 93, no. 1 (Jun 2006): 117-146.
  

• Stallman, "The Free Software Definition," (2004).
  

• Unsworth, "The Next Wave: Liberation Technology," Chronicle of Higher Education 50, no. 21 (30 Jan 2004).

• Lessig, "Creatives Face a Closed Net," Financial Times (28 Dec 2005).

In the readings that you've done so far, you've learned that vast numbers of primary and secondary sources are either being digitized or are 'born digital' every year, and that the rate of online accumulation is increasing rapidly. Roy Rosenzweig argued that historians are in the midst of a shift from a culture of scarcity to a culture of abundance. How do you think that this shift to abundance will affect the daily practice of academic historians, public historians, cultural heritage professionals (at museums, libraries, archives), and the general public? Will some kinds of topics or methodologies become more or less prominent? Will there be a crisis of authority? Will 'scarcity' take on new meanings? Will new modes of historical consciousness arise? Feel free to focus on whatever aspects of the question most interest you. You should link to the work of other people when appropriate (of course), and your final essay should be between 750 and 1500 words.