Pasts in Space: Creating and curating your gazetteer

Speakers: Valeria Vitale (University of Sheffield), Tom Elliott (New York University) 

Venue: Senate House MakerSpace (room 265) 

In person. 

Pasts in space is a two-day series of workshops for historians, archivists, and archaeologists. Through discussion and hands-on exploration, participants will learn about resources and techniques for using, creating, and sharing information about past places and spaces for their research, teaching, and scholarly communication. Particular emphasis will be placed on theoretical and "fuzzy” aspects: how to deal with incomplete, unlocatable, contingent, disputed, and uncertain toponyms and locations over the course of a project or investigation. 

Students and scholars at all career stages and all levels of technical knowledge are welcome. 

22 October: Getting started creating and curating your own "gazetteer" 

Part 1: Toward usable data 

- Spatial knowledge systems and models for understanding and structuring spatial data: from coordinates to relationships. 

- Different definitions of the same "place" 

- Machine-actionable formats for past-oriented data, including the Linked Places Format, the Text Encoding Initiative, and Comma-Separated Values (CSV). 

Part 2: Creating and curating 

- Incremental data collection and editing 

- Tracing origins and controlling data versions over time 

Dr. Valeria Vitale 
Lecturer in Digital Humanities, School of History, Philosophy and Digital Humanities, University of Sheffield
https://www.sheffield.ac.uk/hpdh/people/dhi-staff/valeria-vitale

Dr. Tom Elliott
Associate Director for Digital Programs and Senior Research Scholar, Institute for the Study of the Ancient World, New York University
https://isaw.nyu.edu/people/staff/tom-elliott