Cultural Heritage Objects and Exhibits

Monday, June 22, 10:00am-12:30pm

Whether creating online exhibits or engaging with primary source materials, the potential for digital projects that utilize cultural heritage materials range from basic to complex. This workshop will explore the range of digital materials available and the platforms–including Omeka and WordPress–that faculty are using to engage students with these materials.

Outline

  • Faculty introductions (15 min)
  • Introduction to cultural heritage objects and exhibits (20 min)
  • Faculty showcase (20 min)
  • Hands-on exploration of Omeka S (30 min)
  • Break (15 min)
  • How did they make that? (30 min)
  • Other resources and next steps (20 min)

Links and Handouts

Instructors and Moderators

  • Sarah Pugachev, Director, Research Initiatives, s.pugachev@rochester.edu
  • Autumn Haag, Assistant Director, Rare Books, Special Collections, and Preservation
  • Emily Sherwood, Director, Digital Scholarship Lab, esherwood@library.rochester.edu
  • Lisa Wright, Digitization Specialist, lwright@library.rochester.edu
  • Maggie Dull, Head of Metadata Strategies, mdull@library.rochester.edu

Introduction and Faculty Showcase

Building a Site

Digital Scholar

Digital Scholar is a hosted web platform powered by Reclaim Hosting–and supported by the Digital Scholarship Lab–that that facilitates quick and easy deployment of digital scholarship projects. There are over 100 applications available in Digital Scholar, include WordPress, Scalar, Omeka, mediawiki, Drupal, and MySQL. For more information, see the FAQ.

Omeka Basics

  • Omeka S Tour: This screen cast walks you through the interface and components of an Omeka S site. It is a good, quick introduction to the tool.
  • Omeka S User Manual: The user manual provides instructions for doing almost anything you might want to do with an Omeka site. For creating a course project,

Modules

Modules are small programs that you can add to your site to help Omeka do more. All official modules are listed on the Omeka S site. Below are some useful modules and their descriptions from the Omeka S website:

  • CustomVocab: Create custom vocabularies and add them as data types to your resource templates.
  • Mapping: Mapping is a module for Omeka S which allows you to geolocate Omeka S items and add interactive maps to Site Pages.
  • AltText: An Omeka S module to allow users to specify custom alt text for media.
  • CSVImport: This module will allow users to import Entities from a simple CSV (comma separated value) file, and then map the CSV column data to Entity. Each row in the file represents metadata for a single Entity.

Accessibility

Omeka strives to make the platform as accessible as possible. They provide a detailed accessibility statement in their documentation.

Still, when creating an Omeka site, it is important to not inadvertently create barriers for users that have physical or situational disabilities, or poor internet access. Below are some tips and tools that can help to make your site inclusive to as many users as possible.

  • Include alt-text for images. This is a description of what is contained within an image for screen readers and other adaptive software so that all are able to understand the content regardless of visual ability.
  • Avoid visually challenging color combinations such as red and green, or white font on black background.
  • Underline things that are hyperlinked rather than relying on colored font to indicate the link.
  • Do not “open tab in a new window” as it can be disorientating for those with visual impairments.
  • Stay away from text or images that flash or blink
  • Use a theme created by Omeka S. If using another theme, ensure that it adheres to basic accessibility standards. (Look for an accessibility statement with the theme you would like to use).

Privacy

When creating a public digital project, it is important to talk to your students about privacy. Below are some topics and options for consideration.

  • Visibility: Any page or item in Omeka can be set to private.
  • Roles: Omeka allows customized roles and permissions for different users. These roles allow for enhanced privacy.
  • FERPA: It’s important to remember UofR’s FERPA Guidelines when asking students to produce coursework that may be public. While FERPA primarily applies to grades and “any personally identifiable information in the student’s education records,” it’s good practice to discuss any academic work that you want to make public and be sure students are comfortable and consent to doing so.

Project Tips

Sources

There are many digital collections of cultural heritage materials available online. Below is a list of places to get started.

Metadata

Understanding metadata is critical to a successful cultural heritage project. Below are some resources to get you and your students started thinking about metadata, why it matters, and how to apply it to a project.

  • Understanding Metadata and Metadata Resources – This is a great place to get started understanding metadata. It has also some excellent resources for further information.
  • Dublin Core – Omeka uses a metadata standard called Dublin Core. This link provides more information about Dublin Core and how you might use different metadata elements.
  • Data Dictionary – You can use this template to map out the metadata for your digital collection.
  • Metadata Outreach – River Campus Libraries has metadata experts that can help you start to think about this issues. Visit our metadata outreach page to learn more.
  • Anti-Racist Description Resources – “As part of its commitment to anti-oppression values, especially our commitment to critically examine archival theory and practice, has compiled research and case studies created by archivists across the field into a set of best practice recommendations for an anti-oppressive approach to creating and remediating archival description.” from Archives for Black Lives: Archivists Respond to Black Lives Matter

Need Help?

This is just a start. We’re happy to help you discuss your project, find resources, and facilitate training. Feel free to reach out to the Digital Scholarship Lab or contact your Outreach Librarian.

Digital Scholarship Lab
Outreach, Learning & Research