Digital Humanities Commons^™

Network + Publication + Ecosystem: Curating Digital Pedagogy, Fostering Community, Rebecca Frost Davis, Matthew K. Gold, Katherine D. Harris

Publications and Research

We are excited to share our work on Digital Pedagogy in the Humanities (DPiH), which was published on the Humanities Commons in 2020 by the Modern Language Association after almost a decade of work. DPiH is a large-scale scholarly project that presents the stuff of teaching (syllabi, assignments, and resources) through a curated set of keywords such as “Poetry,” “Disability,” “Queer,” and “Annotation,” among many others. For each keyword, a curator or set of curators has selected and annotated ten pedagogical artifacts; created a curator’s selection statement; and presented …

English Learners In Nyc, Raquel Neris

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

English Learners in NYC is a Digital Humanities project that intersects Migration Studies and Foreign Language Learning Studies by presenting a podcast series about the learning experience of international students in English as a Second Language (ESL) programs at English schools in New York City. The project aims to provide visibility to the educational migration in this specific context and to promote a discussion on how international students and educators can reimagine their teaching and learning experience. It also aims to reveal ESL schools' challenges during the COVID-19 pandemic and how they incorporated digital technologies during and after this event. …

Coloniality, Western Science, And Critical Ethnic Studies In Stem Education, Latoya M. Strong

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

In this dissertation, I use a critical transdisciplinary approach to examine how the coloniality of Western Science impacts science education teaching, learning, and research. Weaving together Black geographies, settler colonialism, and decolonial theory, I illustrate how the historical, symbiotic relationship between colonization and Western Science created a culture that continues to shape modern science practices and science education. The coloniality of Western Science was codified into science education, resulting in three approaches to teaching, learning and research—the assimilationist model, the capitalist model, and the imperialist model. Moving from theory to research, I collaborated with STEM educators over six weeks to …

Digital Humanities At Work In The World, Sarah Ruth Jacobs

Publications and Research

No abstract provided.

Engl 130: Writing About Literature In English, Kimberley A. Garcia

Open Educational Resources

This Open and Free Educational Resource (OER) and Zero-Cost Syllabus outlines a set of course materials for English 130: Writing about Literature in English. The course materials provided (all open education resources) include both written and visual texts to accompany and encourage multimodal assignments. The materials provided address literary analysis or composition practices and are adaptable to specific topics or literary works. The course model presented consists of three units (literary analysis, rhetorical analysis & scholarly engagement, and independent research).

Pushing Understanding: Curriculum Resources For Digital Pedagogues, M. Rubin

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Whether one wishes to admit it or not, the classroom is a distinct and separate space from the rest of the world with its own rules, expectations, and environment. Even when a class takes place outside of a classroom, the space takes on the role of a classroom, if not outright becoming a classroom in every form aside from shape. This is not unlike, for instance, a tabletop game: even if not played on a literal tabletop, a tabletop game remains identifiable as such, and its rules and expectations remain the same, as does even its environment. A course may …

Brujas Of Yesterday, Their Legacy Today, Maggi Delgado

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Brujas of Yesterday, their Legacy Today explores the impact of witch narratives on the lives of Latin American women. This bilingual interactive space collects both myths passed down through generations, ones still taught today, and stories of real women who bear the consequences of the legendary bruja character. Like witch hunts of women who did not fit the model of a “good woman,” the now correctly named femicides are examples of the prevailing misogynistic and anti-feminist rhetoric plaguing Latin American cultures diasporas. With a digital interactive map and timeline, the project aims to breathe new life into these old tales, …

K-12 Digital Pedagogy: An Open Educational Resource Designed To Build A Community Of Practitioners, Kelly Hammond

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The COVID-19 pandemic created the need for a necessarily steep increase in technology use among K-12 teachers around the world, as education shifted suddenly to remote learning in the early spring of 2020 and then to a mix of remote, hybrid, and in-person learning where it remains. Over the same time period, events in the United States sharply increased the visibility of systemic racism, particularly against Black and Asian American citizens—racism that, like all social biases, is often replicated or intensified through misapplications or uncritical uses of technology, data gathering, and analysis. The rapid development of teachers’ practical skills and …

Remixing The Canon: Shakespeare, Popular Culture, And The Undergraduate Editor, Andie Silva

Publications and Research

This essay explores the benefits and challenges of using digital editing as a platform for social knowledge production. First, I discuss the underlying impetus for the project, my choice of Scalar as a digital platform, and a number of specific assignments designed to develop skills toward the final edition. Next, I analyze examples from student work, considering the larger implications of students’ annotation choices and the thematic focus each of them chose for their acts. Finally, I outline some of the potential pitfalls of this course. My aim is to privilege students’ discovery, negotiation, and ownership of ideas. As a …

Digital Humanities At Cuny. Building Communities Of Practice In The Public University, Stefano Morello

Publications and Research

In this essay, I reflect on my experience working in the field of Digital Humanities at The Graduate Center (GC) of the City University of New York (CUNY) to refute the misconception that the point of intersection of humanities and computation is dependent on robust technological infrastructure and, therefore, outside of the reach of underfunded public institutions. On the contrary, my tenure as a GC Digital Fellow suggests that the development of DH communities of practice can be an especially valuable asset for public universities, due to the waterfall effect they can produce for both the academic and the local …

Testimony To The Cuny Board Of Trustees In Opposition To The Resolution To Approve A Contract With Turnitin For Plagiarism Detection Software, December 14th, 2020 Meeting, Luke Waltzer, Lisa M. Rhody, Roxanne Shirazi

Publications and Research

This statement was drafted in response to the Board of Trustee's consideration of a resolution to approve CUNY's contract renewal with Turnitin in 2020. The authors circulated the petition on December 3, 2020, and submitted the final version -- signed by 1065 members of the CUNY community -- to the Board of Trustees on December 7, 2020 for consideration at their meeting on December 14th, 2020.

Rethinking Gaming & Representation Within Digital Pedagogy: An Instructor’S Guide, Anthony Wheeler

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This work fully analyzes the creation process and implementation of a deeply-structured social commentary in the form of a digital interactive-fiction, created in the open software known as Twine. My co-developer, Raven Gomez, and I created a game that explores the challenges of navigating spaces within higher education as someone who identifies as something considered to be “other” by the standards of the common Western curriculum. Once the infrastructure of the product itself is outlined, this work follows students in an English Composition I course throughout their experiences creating digital interactive-fiction games based on pivotal moments in their lives that …

Through The Scholastic Looking Glass: The Pedagogical Potential Of Textual Deformation For Poetic Studies, Taylor Dietrich

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This thesis examines the pedagogical usefulness of the antithetical reading model of textual deformation for the study of poetic works. No formal pedagogical plan exists for the education of students in poetic studies through textual deformance. This thesis does not go as far as structuring one in its entirety. Rather, it surveys the digital humanities landscape, showing a collective affinity within a number of textual studies approaches that advocate for textual deformance as useful for interrogating texts, and aligns the overlapping symmetries within those working methodologies with pedagogical imperatives like those embedded in Ryan Cordell’s Kaleidoscopic Pedagogy Laboratory—the intent being …

Cultural Heritage Preservation In The Context Of Climate Change Adaptation Or Relocation: Barbuda As A Case Study, Martha B. Lerski

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This case study introduces an arts camp methodology of engaging communities in identifying their key cultural heritage features, thus serving as a meta study. It presents original research based on field studies on the climate-vulnerable Caribbean island of Barbuda during 2017 and 2018. Its Valued Cultural Elements survey, enabling precise identification of key tangible and intangible art forms and biocultural practices, may serve as a basis for further studies. Such approaches may facilitate future research or planning as climate-vulnerable communities harness Local or Indigenous Knowledge for purposes of biocultural heritage preservation, or towards adaptation or relocation. I report on findings …

Fashion Merchandising: An Augmented Reality, Naeha A. Sayed

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

There is a continuous and constant transformation in the field of Augmented Reality (AR), both in the Retail, and the Manufacturing sector. It has started to influence everything from fashion runway shows to online shopping. Consumers dynamics have shifted in the fashion industry, the ways becoming more dominant than the old observant ones- the simple buying experience no longer satisfies them. Due to the emergence of the new digital platforms and technological enhancements, the consumers are looking for more- be it a more exciting buying experience or more user interaction or more enhanced products. This technological change starts with the …

The Ladies' Garment Worker Speaks Volumes For The Woman Worker And Writer, Carolyn J. Cei

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The nine volumes of The Ladies’ Garment Worker, put through text analysis, would help find the voice of the International Ladies Garment Workers’ Union through their own publications. On a CUNY Commons site this analysis would provide digital images of each publication along with a timeline of frequently-used words and phrases that connect to each other; this analysis would establish the main “voice” and identity of the ILGWU women that would create a personified entity during these the issue that is analyzed, which is Volume 1 that was published throughout 1901. The identity of women workers, even under the …

A Pedagogical Search For Home And Care, Marta Effinger-Crichlow

Publications and Research

No abstract provided.

Software Of The Oppressed: Reprogramming The Invisible Discipline, Erin R. Glass

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation offers a critical analysis of software practices within the university and the ways they contribute to a broader status quo of software use, development, and imagination. Through analyzing the history of software practices used in the production and circulation of student and scholarly writing, I argue that this overarching software status quo has oppressive qualities in that it supports the production of passive users, or users who are unable to collectively understand and transform software code for their own interests. I also argue that the university inadvertently normalizes and strengthens the software status quo through what I call …

Alternative Futures: The Creative Reconsideration Of Fashion Objects, Kathryn Roberts

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This project is the beginning of what I intend to be a larger, evolving work that seeks to marry the theoretical with the practical when considering fashion objects that have “served their purpose”. The object at the project’s focal point: a worn out pair of blue jeans. My particular focus on jeans is based on the fact that they, alongside the t-shirt, are one of the most ubiquitous and commonly owned pieces of clothing for people all over the world. This wardrobe staple transcends age, race, and class, as it occupies an iconic status that has made them invulnerable to …

The Bronx Was Brewing: A Digital Resource Of A Lost Industry, Michelle Zimmer

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The Bronx: a bucolic oasis laden with history, a suburb within city-limits, an urban warzone, and thanks to the recent renaissance, a phoenix of progress rising from the proverbial ashes of the fires that burned through the borough in the 1970’s. But many people are unaware that the Bronx also brewed.
Uncovering the brewing industry of the Bronx tells not only the story of the lost industry, but it also communicates the narrative of the development of the Bronx. The brewers were German immigrants who developed a thriving industry by introducing lager beer to the United States by taking advantage …

Going Public: How And Why To Develop A Digital Scholarly Identity, Katina Rogers, Lisa M. Rhody, Danica Savonick, Lisa Tagliaferri

Publications and Research

Establishing a meaningful digital identity is essential to managing one’s scholarly and professional reputation. This workshop addresses ways to cultivate an online identity and offers guidance on “going public” using tools and strategies for building a community around your work. Topics include social media, writing for different audiences, personal websites, digital dissertations, and more.

Equality Archive: Open Educational Resources As Feminist Praxis, Shelly J. Eversley, Laurie Hurson

Publications and Research

Statement on EqualityArchive.com as an instance of open educational resources as feminist praxis.

K-12 Education, Pedagogy And Student Achievement, Genevieve Johnson

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

K-12 Education, Pedagogy and Student Achievement is a study of traditional public schools and charter schools in New York City. The project takes District 2 in Manhattan and District 23 in Brooklyn as its focus in consideration of the effects of difference on student learning. This project argues for constructivist pedagogies in K-12 learning to produce literacy and equity in under-resourced school.

As If By Magic: Unleashing Critical And Expressive Voices Through A Rhetoric Of "This/And" In First-Year Composition, Nolan Chessman

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation engages academic, creative, and student genres in conversation in order to challenge the strict discursive and stylistic boundaries placed around college writing, particularly in first-year composition. Because this project aims to thrust first-year writing pedagogy beyond the confines of fixed genre forms, its inquiry is multimodal, intermingling writing styles and research modes so that, in scholar-teacher Wendy Bishop’s words, “I can think in and through them all” (“Places to Stand” 17). The particulars—or “data”—informing this study are primarily archival, textual (often a combination of the two), experimental, and experiential. Broadly speaking, this inquiry consists of seven chapters, which …

Literacies Of Bilingual Youth: A Profile Of Bilingual Academic, Social, And Txt Literacies, Michelle A. Mcsweeney

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation identifies three types of language skills that urban Spanish/English bilingual youth possess (academic, social, and texting language), and reports on their relationship while documenting and analyzing the features of text messaging among this population. The participants in this study are Spanish-dominant bilingual young adults enrolled in a high school completion program in New York City. They are in the process of developing both Spanish and English academic literacy skills, and it is well known that they tend to perform below the grade they are enrolled in. For this reason, they are often referred to as being “language-less” (DeCapua …

Thiscollegestory.Com: How Interactive Writing Media Influenced The Way First-Year Students Made Sense Of Their College Transition, Philip Kreniske

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Drawing on insights from Bakhtin (1986) that demonstrated the significance of writing as an interaction, and building on recent developments in narrative analysis that offer insights into narrator’s sense making processes (Daiute, 2014; Lucic, 2013); this research explores how freshmen in an educational opportunity program used interactive writing media to make sense of their transition to college. The exploration involved three main questions and each question concerns students’ development over time:

• First, did college students’ writing in two different media (blogs and word-processed text) differ and did these differences change over time?
• Second, how did the narrators and audience interact …

Excavating Eportfolios: What Student-Driven Data Reveals About Multimodal Composition And Instruction, Amanda M. Licastro

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The pedagogical practice of asking students to compose in open, online spaces has grown rapidly in recent years along with an increase in institutional and financial support. In fact, in July 2013, the Association for Authentic, Experiential and Evidence-Based Learning (AAEEBL) announced the “coming of age” of ePortfolios as the percentage of higher education students using ePortfolios rose above the 50% mark in the U.S. (“About”). There are a host of constituent assertions that support the use of open online writing platforms in college-level courses. These claims include that writing publically cultivates digital literacy through broader audience awareness, facilitates interactivity …

Review: Digital Humanities Pedagogy: Practices, Principles, And Politics, Stephen Brier

Publications and Research

Review of Digital Humanities Pedagogy: Practices, Principles, and Politics, edited by Brett D. Hirsch, multiple authored collection of articles on the theory as well as the practices and principles of the digital humanities and how DH can and has begun to reshape pedagogy in college teaching and learning.

Another Colonialist Tool?, Aaron Barlow

Publications and Research

"the student enrolled in an xMOOC, I believe, is in much the same position as both the student before the teaching machine and the colonized individual. She or he is forced to deal with foreign assumptions having little to do with the reality of the learner or the colonized."

When The Virtual Meets The Real: An Assessment Of The Benefits And "Costs" Of Open Access Texts For First Year Writing Courses At Cuny, Johannah Rodgers

Publications and Research

An assessment of the advantages, drawbacks, and costs of Open Access / OER texts for First Year Writing courses at CUNY.