Methods of DPH and What They’re Good For

In DPH, there’s so many types of projects that you can accomplish, so I’m going to outline a few of them and discuss what each method particularly excels at:

Podcasts
Podcasts is the younger sibling to radio shows. In a podcast, the host tells a story about history, often involving interviews from people involved with the event, community, or individuals in the story. It’s a great medium for both short form content (10 minutes or less) as well as longer form content (some podcast episodes last over an hour or the same story is continued over multiple episodes). Podcasts are also slightly simpler to advertise than some of the other methods on this list, most individuals have a cell phone that can listen to music or videos, and podcasts are often hosted on the same websites as music or videos such as Spotify, Apple Music, Youtube and more. Because of this accessibility to advertise and simplicity of the user using programs they are already familiar with, podcasts are likely the most popular of these methods for the audience, though they are very complicated for the creator. Not only do podcasts have to be researched and written like other methods, they also need to be recorded, have proper sound mixing, and often involve interviews that require both preparation and the ability to find a willing and capable interviewee.

Most of what I would say about Educational Videos falls under the same praises and critiques that podcasts do. I would add that videos are likely higher budget to produce however, as they require the costs of filming and editing film, instead of just audio recording and editing.

Oral Histories
Oral histories have such great value, you get to talk with someone about their life and ask questions to learn more, compared to a memoir where questions would not be answered the same way. I find that oral histories are especially good for researchers, potentially being able to hear someone’s story in their own words, sometimes when they are the last person alive who experienced what they did. But Oral histories, like podcasts, require interviews. This requires the interviewed to be knowledgeable about the topic, compassionate, and easy to talk to. The last two, requiring charisma, which is not easily taught to individuals who lack it naturally. In addition oral histories require the ability to find a willing and capable interviewee, which is not a simple tasks. Another difficulty of performing oral history is that it cannot be scripted, therefore, there is significant work that must occur to make an accurate subtitle or transcript for the oral history. I also believe that oral histories are great for researchers, but much harder to engage with for an audience. They often lack much of the context for the audience going into the subjects in question and oral histories lack a unifying website to listen to many oral histories in succession like Spotify serves for podcasts.

Timelines
Timelines, but especially interactive timelines, are pretty great for the audience. They are engaging (where podcasts and oral histories may be engaging, but also have the ability for the listener to zone out and miss information) and more visual for visual learners in the audience. Some of the drawbacks are that there’s not universally loved timeline software for digital historians, it’s very subjective to the creator and project itself what software will be used. Timelines are helpful for projects with defined dates, but it isn’t always as simple for projects with less defined dates (for instance dates become fuzzier the further back in history you go, a problem I’m facing with my own timeline project.) Timelines also require more steps for advertising, the likely need both a unique host site, but also social media or other advertising to make the project known to the public.

Omeka Sites
Omeka sites are tricky. They both have unlimited applications, but also surprisingly feel limited. Omeka sites are great for things you have media for, but not as easy for itemless things. Such should be expected from a digital archive. I find a lot of problems using Omeka for my Wives of Agency project, as much of the media I have may be connected to events, but there’s also many media-less events, which feel strange to input and look through in the program. I also find that the visual design of Omeka is hard to make look good, and the exhibit builder plug-in could be a bit more robust than it currently is. Omeka, like timelines, also requires a lot of external advertising to get the word out. I have had a hard time finding ways to change the search terms that would bring up my Omeka sites, meaning Google SEO is not as helpful as another website could be.

StoryMaps
I am much less familiar with Arc GIS StoryMaps, as I have never personally made one, but mapping isn’t my forte. StoryMaps are highly visual and also require spatial information that some projects just don’t have. For instance if I were to have made my Wives of Agency project in a StoryMap, nearly a quarter of the events would all take place in Hampton Court, Henry VIII’s primary residence after 1540. That would not make for an appealing StoryMap. I will say though that StoryMaps are very attractive, it does not seem like it takes much work to make the program look elegant. StoryMaps do have a built in gallery to view other StoryMaps made by both the same creator and other creators, but it’s not the most easily navigable, so it likely needs external advertising like many other methods on this list.

Video Games
You didn’t think I would skip out on educational video games would you? First: video games are hard to make, even when using a video game engine, there’s still a lot of custom coding required to make the product. Video games, are also not as typical as some of the other options on this list. In fact many educational games have to simplify the concepts within in order to better manage the game systems or playability, which for some types of educational, like history, may seem traitorous. I feel like video games still have their place though, especially for K-12, video games can grab student’s attention and provide a memorable type of hands-on-learning. In addition, video games can come with ingrained advertising, though less for the K-12 audience and more of interested individuals. Video games, even independently created games, can be hosted on platforms such as Steam which have a store that advertises games to users that the Steam algorithm thinks they will like, but also users can search for games by name, keywords, or tags like “educational” or “historical.” Video games are definitely not perfect for all subjects, but they can be a meaningful way to relay information to the audience regardless.

Conclusion

Public history projects can easily be influenced by the type of project and it’s subject, when one idea could easily be a podcast or a StoryMap, sometimes it’s up to the developer over the type they prefer to create, or which ever they can get funding for.  For instance the same information on an Omeka site may not translate well to a podcast, especially if the subject is something visual like art. Video games may not be the perfect fit for a serious or tragic topic, but an oral history might. There is no one-type-to-rule-them-all, digital history has to weigh the pros and cons of each method against the target subject and audience to determine what’s best.