With advancing technology and globalization, digital public history projects have progressed over time. A comparative review of the digital public history projects in three different phases reveals noticeable changes from the projects that began as content focused to projects that are content and audience focused. At the same time, the creators of the projects had to consider the digital space. For example, the digital public history work during phase 1 is more content driven. The technology might be outdated, but the historical content plays an important role in all three projects in this phase. In the first example, “Blackout History Project,” some of the hyperlinks were no longer working. Also, phase 1 includes minimal audience engagement; however, there is more audience engagement in the last two projects of this phase. The images, videos, and audio recordings provide different ways of viewing the historical content; and they allow the audience to think about history differently. “Blackout History Project” and “The Progress of a People” seem to centralize the historical content as if it was presented in an academic manner (e.g. lecture); however, I can see that all three projects were reflecting a shift or change in making public history available to a broader audience. A basic mapping tool appears in the third project: “The Great Chicago Fire and the Web of Memory.” The digital tools used in phase 1 projects convey the importance of beginning to engage the audience with the historical content through a digital space for the contextualizing strategy, which Sam Wineburg defines it as situating “the document and its events in time and place” in order to be “Thinking Like a Historian.”
For phase 2, the digital public history projects include more digital tools, audience engagement, and recognition of collaboration. In addition to educational resources, a project’s site presents other ways of engaging with a general audience. Phase 2 includes less hyperlinks and more embedded links and images that can be clicked on for more information. Also, phase 2 includes more galleries or exhibits for the scanned images of documents and other artifacts. Phase 2 projects invite the audience to think like a historian in the intermediate stages of contextualizing, close reading, and reading silence. “Jasenovac: Holocaust Era in Croatia” introduces the audience to public history that might have been hidden or rarely exposed. “A More Perfect Union: Japanese Americans and the U.S…” is another project that presents historical content that most U.S. history books only provide a snippet of information. “Raid on Deerfield” introduces the audience to view the history of English settlers and their conflict with the French and native allies. The phase 2 projects represent social injustice in different countries, and they convey the importance of global perspectives in order to share public history in a digital space.
In phase 3, the digital public history projects include updated digital tools, collaboration, and more audience engagement. The projects that collaborate with a museum and local historical society or library are “Lincoln at 200” and “Bracero History Archive.” Some of the project sites such as “Bracero History Archive” and “Operation War Diary” encourage the audience to contribute to the project. Also, some of the projects use social media to collaborate with the audience and spread the word about the project. There is also a search option in two of the projects. The digital tools in phase 3 are more advanced in presenting the historical content and engaging the audience. Some of the projects have both audio recordings with transcriptions for ADA compliance. The “Manifold Greatness…” is a great example. Some of digital public history projects have resources for further reading and for classroom purposes. By including more collaboration, audience engagement, and advanced digital tools in a digital space, phase 3 projects introduce the audience to the strategies of contextualizing, close reading, using background knowledge, reading the silences, and corroborating.
Furthermore, good digital public history work should continue adapting to the changing and advancing technology, updating websites, presenting historical content that challenges the audience to “think like a historian,” adding more scholarship, finding ways to engage the audience to understand the value of researching public history, and acknowledging a diverse audience. With all of these things in mind, it is also best to continue updating the guidelines for reviewing digital public history work.
In the field of digital public history, there are several promising new directions. It will create more grants and fellowships for scholars to think like a historian and bring awareness of missing or rarely known part of public history to a wide audience. Also, this field will steer in the direction of global digital public history projects that will reach out to an even wider audience for cultural and historical understanding. Soon, almost every major institution or organization will begin to hire public historians. This field is unique in the sense that it brings academic and non-academic passions together for a greater purpose. The humanistic approach to digital public history comes into fruition when it becomes an inclusive rather than exclusive way of audience engagement and participation along with collaboration from academic and non-academic institutions or organizations.
