Embracing Change in Teaching, Learning, and Research: A Historical Perspective at Tufts University

1. Waiting for the Gettysburg Address or Gregory Crane Professor of Classics Winnick Family Chair of Technology and Entrepreneurship Tufts University

2. A Phase Shift in Teaching, Learning, and Research? Gregory Crane Professor of Classics Winnick Family Chair of Technology and Entrepreneurship Tufts University

3. Perseus Project • DL development 1987- • Ancient Greco-Roman Culture • DLI-2: “A Digital Library for the Hum.” • Up through early 20th century • Calculatedly disparate collections • Production: www.perseus.tufts.edu • 9million pages/month, 85% Greco-Roman • Research: what characterizes cultural DLs? • Audience / Services / Content Model Triad • Cross-over: e.g. NSDL work

4. Who delivered the Gettysburg Address?

5. The True Gettysburg Addresser • Edward Everett (1794-1865) • First Eliot Professor of Greek at Harvard • Member of Congress • Governor of Mass • Minister to England • President of Harvard • Secretary of State • US Senator • Candidate for VP

6. Everett’s Address • Long -- and meant to be long • Learned: Athens and America • Sense of place, time and heritage • Historical: who did what • Epic in spirit: recounted what happened • Particularist: celebrated particular events • Fixing memory

7. Lincoln’s Address • Short -- and meant to be short • General: very little specific background • “four score and seven” but little else • Analytical: what does this mean? • Lyric in spirit • Generalizing: abstracting from particulars • Details filtered out

8. Gettysburg Address • A Particular Historical Transition • Decline of the orator/preacher • Decline of learned humanist culture • Rise of the brief communication to a mass audience • A General Historical Process • Superficially: from elite to mass • In fact: creation of new elite

9. Cyberinfrastructure • Collaboration, Interdisciplinarity • More praised than truly practiced • Social barriers and intellectual limits • Cyberinfrastructure • Potential “document/dbase solvent” • Recombinant DNA model • Lincoln replacing Everett

10. Human beings are curious • [US Citizens are human beings!] • Mass Media Outlets • Discovery Channel, History Channel, PBS • American Experience vs. Antiques Road Show • Diverse topics of public interest: • Civil War, Railroad, Quilts, Greek Revival etc.

11. Role of Government? • Models for Cyberinfrastructure • National Parks: public space • Museums: objects and themes • Public Libraries: broad education/engagement • Public Education: universal in reach • Public records, e.g., historical commissions

12. Universal “Literacy” • Reading as a general term • Analyze/relate new experience to old/learn • Language: natural, mathematical, computational • Pictures • 3D objects • Spaces • Example: choosing a home

13. Readable Space

14. Readable Space

15. Readable Space

16. Readable Space • Recommender systems in place • Shared data: Real Estate MLS system • Multiple views of the same data • Multiple dimensions to be explored: • Hayes/Mcdonnell family - text/genealogy • Architecture: Greek Revival/1840s • Space: Fresh Pond/Mt Auburn Cemetery

17. Innovations • Technical infrastructure • Databases, front end design, etc. • Established technologies • Engineering rather than fundamental research • Social Infrastructure key • Darwinian competitition for listings/sales • Realtor/Realtor Agency/Agency • Multiple Listing Service • Dual Representation System

18. Cyberinfrastructure • “Next Big Thing” • Managed by NSF, seeking billions • Will pbly go farther • New infrastructure for research assumes • Interdisciplinary work • Evolving disciplines (e.g., Bioinformatics) • Change as constant • How does the NSDL fit in?

19. Cyberinfrastructure: 1 • We here are not the primary audience • We are trustees for subsequent generations • Need to face radically different environments • Need to separate strategic values from material habits -- e.g., oral vs. literate poetry • Question:given a 5-10 year lag time • How we will support those now 20 and younger?

20. Cyberinfrastructure: 2 • Document - Reader is second order relation • Many Doc-Doc conversations precede • DL System customizes information up front • The Digital Library • Provides dynamic reading environment • Automatically updates itself • Constitutes the center of gravity • Even without integrated DL, will our students carry piles of paper or libraries with them?

21. Cyberinfrastructure: 3 • A networked world removes physical barriers surrounding academic info/ideas • K-12 students/faculty only one component • History Museums -- MOST influential source • Historical Societies, Historical Commissions • History Channel, American Experience • Hollywood and historical fiction • Like the NSDL, it must support K-gray intellectual life • Rosenzweig & Thelen, Presence of the Past • http://chnm.gmu.edu/survey/

22. Cyberinfrastructure: 4 • (At least) three interacting variables • Services -- what real people can do • Audiences -- who does what • Data -- what resources are available • Each drives the other two, e.g. • New data (GENOME, Geospatial, language) • --> new questions --> new audiences --> new services --> new data • We need to think about all three

23. Technologies

24. Visualization & Language Tech

25. Technologies • Machine translation • Bad translation opens up new worlds • E.g., Later Latin and European High Culture • Language Technologies • Monolingual vs. Multilingual • Encyclopedic vs. Semantic

26. Language Technologies • Cambridge Civil War Monument (1870) • Making the visible readable • Augmented Reality BUT • This is also a language technology problem

27. Cambridge Civil War Monument • Lists of Names --> Contextualizing info • City Dir: Sam Palmer was a clerk at the Suffolk Bank and lived on 111 Inman Street • What sort of work did he do? • Who else lived on Inman Street? • He was in the Mass 11 and died at Four Forks • Where did this regiment go? • What was it doing at Four Forks?

28. Basic Technologies • Single Document Summarization • Multidocument Summarization • Named Entity Detection & Tracking • Relation Detection and Tracking • Customization for particular users

29. Making Space Readable • Graphical interfaces necessary • Augmented/virtual reality • Geospatial Coordinates --> GIS • Customization • Summarization

30. Named Entity Detection

31. Graphical Visualizations of Text • Maps: Global, Regional, City • Integration of text and GIS • Timelines • Dynamic, multiple scales • Event Detection • Multiple tools

32. Top Down 1: Time & Space

33. Top Down 2: Automatic Timeline

34. Top Down 3: Book Timeline

35. Top Down 4: Mapping

36. Event Detection

37. Underlying Architecture • Common schemes for naming • “Mark Twain” and “Samuel Clemens” • --> “Twain, Mark, 1835-1910” • Similar conventions for structure, actions, etc. • Documents talk to each other • Atlas/GIS, Encyclopedias, Glossaries • Systems customize data for users • Background & present goals • Systems control the look and feel

38. Conclusions • Design issues are central • Front-end design is necessary but not sufficient • Few care about our unique “look & feel” • Our sites provide means not ends • http://www.digitalpreservation.gov • Key Challenge: Clean Atomic Structures • Every component in a document should be • Easily abstractable • Freely re-usable • Assume cherry-picking as the norm

39. Conclusions • Everett, not Lincoln, has been our model • Experts are at the center • Very heavy expectations on our audience • Large, self-contained, introspective docs • Support democratization of knowledge • Lincoln’s more accessible language • Watch for and help define new elites • NSDL as a catalyst in a much larger process