Project Proposal
My project proposal for the George Mason University’s Digital Public Humanities Graduate Certificate Digital Public History assignment revolves around the Great Irish Potato Famine during the middle of the nineteenth century. This is an event that has been discussed in schools whether in law, medical, history majors, grade school, etc. I would like to make it more accessible to the by the public putting the resources in one place but also letting the public contribute to the resources. While the general history of the subject is important to recount, I am much more interested in the public reaction to the event. The questions that I wish to explore for the project on the Great Irish Potato Famine include the following:
- What were the public reactions to the Famine in Ireland, presumably the most impacted area?
- How did the international community, to include England, Scotland and the United States, react to the Famine, especially in regard to policies generated for aid and refuge?
- How did those reactions impact the way the Irish were subsequently treated in their own country and abroad?
In order to answer these initial questions, I will be looking at a variety of sources. For example, the initial sources that I explored and is available on my Omeka website were newspaper articles, specifically those from London, African American newspaper articles particularly from the United States, and cartoons or images found in newspapers throughout the world. I also looked at medical journals, poems, songs, letter to the editors, and recitations to find out what the average person living in the nineteenth century Ireland, England, Scotland, United States thought. As I continue my research, I hope to find similar sources depicting the Great Irish Potato Famine. I also want to see if I can find stories from their descendants to get first-hand experiences of the struggles of those who lived through the Famine. I will also research other historical secondary sources in order to dissect how the event has been recorded over the last century and a half.
For my digital technologies, I am going to use Omeka and various plugins such as Contribution, Neatline and Exhibit Builder. While I am still not sure of the final list of plugins, I will use these as a starting point. With regard to the engagement of the public, I intend on providing the option for them to contribute to the project. For example, if they have any historical artifacts, correspondence, or even photos from the era or about the Famine that they found or past down to them by their ancestors that they wish to post, they can do so on my project. This is an excellent way to generate interest in the subject and encourage the public to be involved in the recording of history for future generations to use. In light of the fact that we are currently in the 174th year since the start of the Famine in 2019, this project can be used to gather as much information as possible to commemorate the 175th anniversary next year in 2020.
For the reason that I would like to generate as much interest in this subject as possible, I intend to gear the project to a wide audience. My target audiences will include those interested in the history of Ireland, emigration, agriculture, legislation, disaster studies, disaster relief, the British monarchy, race relations, medical studies in the physical responses to Famine, religion, cultural and social history, and of course, the actual event of Irish Potato Famine.
I also want to attract the attention of more those more technically savvy with the hopes of using this project as a historical foundation for more computer science-related projects and products. By combining the historical context and the digital world, we can collaborate with computer scientists in order to create new and exciting opportunities for the historical public!