Past Voices

Welcome to Past Voices, where I share my random, often incomplete thoughts on the digital humanities, web design, museums, and other interests. For the uninitiated, “digital humanities” is an umbrella term for the many uses of new media and digital technologies to advance the complete spectrum of thought and practice in the humanities. Typically, I discuss history related projects; however all topics are fair game. Feel free to join the discussion, after all, interpreting the past in the twenty-first century relies on shared authority.

The Latest

Lessons Learned Building the "Community Documentation Initiative" Website

Written for the NCPH Working Group, "Public History Online, Using the Web to Collaborate and Share" (2012)

What makes for an effective public history website? In my opinion, the best serve a distinct purpose, feature balanced content, provide simple navigation, and include various opportunities for user interaction. Until recently, museums, universities, and cultural resource centers have focused too much on presenting text-heavy, one-dimensional websites interspersed with mishmashes of media that discourage everyday users from learning, communicating, or collaborating effectively. Trained to write lengthy research papers, articles, and books, scholars are only gradually recognizing that issuing content on the web demands new modes of contextualization in line with an ever-changing digital environment...

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On the Public History Job Hunt

As a public historian, I’m a trained “jack-of-all-trades” in a field known more for its titular ambiguity than its overall purpose. I like to think of our cadre as professionally trained mediators obliged to make the past relevant and useful to a diverse public. Nonetheless, definitions of public history and its uses remain intentionally and intellectually broad so as to attract both interested students, financial resources, and partner institutions alike. Still, does learning how to “wear many different hats” in a field that often points students down multiple career paths necessarily translate to finding a good job?...

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