Final Essay

Here is a link to my final essay titled Open Access in the Digital Humanities

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1dhSFt2WTP0-pT-QFOdBzMRr0FpnmNFiRoXAkhZhpQ0c/edit

Open Access in the Digital Humanities

A Brief Overview of My Final Essay

 First, what is open access? Just like when you ask an individual to define digital humanities (DH), each person has their own spin on what it means. The same can be said for open access, but on a much smaller scale. For purposes of this blog, I will use the definition offered by Peter Suber who is a respected advocate for open access: “Open-access (OA) literature is digital, online, free of charge, and free of most copyright and licensing restrictions.” In my essay, I will elaborate on the meaning of OA because before you can analyze why or why not something should exist, you must first understand what it means.

As we know, DH reflects the Humanities meeting the digital age which makes it easier for information to be readily available to the public. However, OA, as a practice, has been a topic of debate. There are those who speak loud and clear as to the benefits of OA, both for the author and the public. Then as with many things, there are those who raise concerns about the information being made accessible and the potential drawbacks especially to those who are concerned about the future of scholarly communication. In my essay, I will address both sides of the debate. Ultimately, you will see that my opinion is to open the floodgates and let the information flow through, and I will discuss why I am in agreement with those who are in favor of open access.

 Additionally, I will touch on what the future might look like for DH open access. Even though DH is not limited to one field, it is clear that it has a strong presence in academic institutions. Therefore, the academic institutions can play a large role in the future trend of open access. As Jason Heppler states "If the philosophical goal of the university is to serve as the sanctuary of knowledge, then the work we do should be publicly accessible. Not just open access for students, but open access for anyone seeking exposure to the world electronically."

 Finally, I will share some open access works from the DH field that I found of interest. Well, got to get back to working on my essay so I am signing off for now.

My Story

My alarm starts buzzing and wakes me out of a deep sleep. I look out my window and see that it is a cold, dreary Tuesday morning. I am tired and miserable, but I got to get on with the day. I decide to go visit James and Jeff, but only Jeff was there. As Jeff and I were chatting, he was making fun of me and that set me off. I told him to stop over and over again, but he just kept teasing me. I became so angry that I killed him. Jeff, that will teach you not to make fun of other people. After I killed Jeff, I  I took his room keys so I could return later and dispose of his body. I knew at that point that I had missed most of my Digital Humanities class so I decided to go to Hickory Hall to hang out with my friend Ryan hoping that would help me calm down. Ryan was not in his room, and needless to say, this made me angrier. I started making a raucous in the hallway so the RA Matt called me into his room. He told me that I was in trouble and he was going to write me up. I asked Matt not to write the report, but he would not listen to me, so I killed him. I think Matt gets the point now that I didn’t want to be written up. I stuffed Matt’s body in a trash bag and dragged it outside. I loaded the bag onto a UPJ cart and drove to the Student Union where I had earlier texted James to meet me for dinner. Before heading to the cafeteria, I went to the mailroom to pick up a package since it would be closing in a few minutes. As I am standing in line, Justine comes up and jumps the line by getting in front of me. I was not happy, but decided not to say anything. After Justine got her package, the mailroom attendant told me they were now closed for the day and that I could pick up my package tomorrow. I was so furious I did not get my package because Justine had cut in front of me in the line that I followed her as she entered a side bathroom and told her, “See Justine, it isn’t always ladies first.” I shoved her dead body into a trash bag and loaded it onto the UPJ cart I had stolen earlier. I went into the cafeteria to find James, but at that point, he was already gone. I figured that before James gets back to his room, I had better drive the cart back to the Living Learning Center so I can put Jeff into a trash bag and put him in the cart with the other two bodies. Then I would need to find a place to dispose of all three of them. I used the keys I had taken from Jeff earlier and let myself in the room. Just as I was ready to put Jeff’s body in a trash bag, James walked in and saw me. He was now a witness to the fact that I had murdered Jeff and when he said that he was going to report me, I told him that if he did that, he would end  up like Jeff. He started to walk away to notify the campus police and I said “Go ahead James, make my day.”

My Analysis of Convergence

By definition, convergence is the process by which several things come together from different directions so as to eventually meet. Or as Henry Jenkins states on the cover of his book Convergence Culture, "where old and new media collide." It was interesting when Jenkins talked about the reactions from the salespeople when he asked to buy a cell phone that would just make calls without all the bells and whistles. They probably thought he had been living under a rock to not know that those types of phones don't exist anymore. I do remember some years back when I had my iPod shuffle and flip mobile phone and must admit, now with my iPhone, I do like having both my music and my phone in one device. Let's not forget, I can also take pictures, surf the internet, watch movies, and so much more with one "simple" device. Knowing that you could do multiple things with one device makes me question why Jenkins does not believe that a single black box will ever exist. Probably because as he states in his book, "convergence refers to a process, not an endpoint."  However, I must admit, it was true when he said he is seeing more and more boxes instead of less and less. I look at my game room and surrounding my TV is a DVD player, multiple game systems, cable box, etc. I guess the future will tell if a single black box option is just a misconception or not.

 Another interesting point that Jenkins touches on is transmedia storytelling which he indicates came to light in response to media convergence. This involves active audience participation in the telling of a story across multiple platforms. The end result - the audience enjoys a "richer entertainment experience." One of the examples Jenkins uses is The Matrix franchise; read more about what he has to say about this and transmedia storytelling in general by clicking here.

 Convergence is bringing about change and lots of it; in fact, Jenkins says so much so that he wouldn't be able to describe or document all of the changes. I believe that change can be good because many times with change comes improvement. After all, it isn't that old media is going away, it is just going to look new and different as it emerges through each stage in the process. I will be curious to see how the convergence culture plays out especially technologically.

 For more insight into the connection between convergence and DH, check out Defining Digital Humanities where convergence is listed as one of the top ideas and practices that begin to describe DH.