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  • Tehmina Goskar 2:01 pm on 24 April, 2009 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: Byzantium, , , , Persian, review   

    Exhibition reviews on Creative Spaces 

    I thought about using Past Thinking as the place for exhibition and book reviews on museumy subjects that interest me, but instead I would like to contribute to content creation on Creative Spaces (National Museums Online Learning Project) particularly when the reviews related to items in the nine museum collections it hosts.

    I have recently contributed two reviews, and added them to two groups I run. The first is a short response to Shah ‘Abbas at the British Museum and the second is in response to Byzantium at the Royal Academy.

    Read response to Shah Abbas in the Iran and Persian Culture group.

    Read response to Byzantium in the Medieval and Byzantine Objects group.

    Please note: For some reason my paragraphing is not preserved and so the Byzantium review might be a little hard-going. If you happen to read it and would prefer to read it in a more sensible format, please leave a comment here, or on Creative Spaces.

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  • Tehmina Goskar 2:38 pm on 19 March, 2009 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: , italy, , mediterranean, networks, notebooks   

    I like Creative Spaces 

    Creative Spaces does. No poking, no sheep throwing, no nonsense.

    The two posts below and the several comments are enough to set out the different views of Creative Spaces, or the National Museums Online Learning Project. I am not going to respond to the various criticisms leveled at the project as they do a good job of speaking for themselves. This is about my experience so far, over the last two weeks or so of actually using the site. Many of the buggy features have already been pointed out by Tom and by and large I agree with those (strange URLs and registering procedure, the lack of a big fat button to JOIN and the lack of an advanced search are probably my immediate problems).
    (More …)

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  • Tom Goskar 9:52 am on 4 February, 2009 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: documentary, ,   

    Bringing President Lincoln “back to life” 

    Combining laser scans of casts of Lincoln’s ‘life mask’, with photogrammetric techniques, specialists in the USA have created a highly accurate-looking computer generated model of President Lincoln for a documentary entitled “Stealing Lincoln’s Body”. Using photographs, they have created highly detailed texture maps to make his face look as natural as possible.

    The documentary explores plots by a Chicago gang to steal his body in 1876. The clip below gives you a taste of how they have achieved this ambitious project.

    Read more on History’s (“History ™” is the new name for The History Channel…) Lincoln website.

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  • Tom Goskar 10:13 am on 2 July, 2007 Permalink | Reply  

    Historyscape: new heritage mashup 

    Alun Salt from ClioAudio has created a new service called Historyscape, which is an RSS feed that grabs user-submitted websites from Netscape which have been tagged with “Ancient”, “Ancient History”, “Archaeology” and “History”. The feed is ordered by the number of votes each item has received.

    You can subscribe to Historyscape via this RSS feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/Historyscape

    Alun is using Yahoo Pipes and Feedburner to create the service. Details about how he did it are also available.

    This is a great example of why it is important for heritage organisations to make their data available via web services – you can get people doing amazing things with your data. The possibilities would be endless.

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  • Tehmina Goskar 3:29 pm on 20 June, 2007 Permalink | Reply  

    Learn medieval Latin online 

    Much of our past is contained in documents few of us can read, let alone understand and interpret. The National Archives have created a set of online tutorials in beginner’s and advanced medieval Latin and palaeography, or, how to read old handwriting. It is the first time a course like this has been offered, free and online. It will be interesting to see who will take on the twelve-lesson challenges. It claims it does not require prior knowledge of classical Latin (usually what we were taught – those of us that were – at school) and is suitable for beginners or those who want to refresh their skills.

    Can an online experience be more satisfying than learning in a classroom of people where you hesitate with your ablatives and datives? Will anyone come out of these courses able to have a good stab at old documents in an archive and to debate hotly with another how many minims a word contains? Will these courses be able to convey the importance of grammatic jargon that goes with learning Latin, and still inspire through the gems contained in documents such as Domesday book?

    Although I am reading many documents in medieval Latin at the moment, I am going to take the online medieval Latin challenge and report back with a comparison with my book-based and classroom experience.

    Medieval Latin, Beginners’ Level (1086-1733)
    http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/Latin/Beginners

    Medieval Latin, Advanced Level (1086 – 1733)
    http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/Latin/Advanced

    Palaeography, Reading Old Handwriting (1500-1800)
    http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/Palaeography

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    • evan 8:12 pm on 30 June, 2007 Permalink

      You might find that the downloadable Latin lessons on the Latin podcast help to speed up your Latin. although the Latin on offer is all, so far, Classical latin, and spoekn using the Restored Classical Pronunciation, it provides a useful counterbalance to the very useful, but rather dry material on the National Archives website.
      http://latinum.mypodcast.com

    • Stuart 3:00 pm on 6 July, 2007 Permalink

      I tried to learn Latin the traditional way – and didn’t do too well – so I think this sounds like an interesting intiative. There are plenty of books and manuscripts in libraries and museums where transcription, translation and commentaries are lacking. I think there’s probably a low awareness of how many orginal documents are available for the person of the street to study and look at.

      http://www.vam.ac.uk/vastatic/microsites/1265_frost/

  • Tom Goskar 4:23 pm on 16 November, 2006 Permalink | Reply  

    What was here? 

    This week sees the launch of wherewashere.com:

    whatwasHere.com wants to revolutionise how history is written. Its pilot website in Liverpool tells history like it’s never been told before: by everyone. It doesn’t only tell the capital H history of Liverpool, but the everything-interesting-that-ever-happened-to-the-people-who-actually-live-there history of Liverpool. It’s oral history for the My Space era.

    Based around Google maps, the site lets people instantly publish the stories that matter to them on the spot where they happened, discuss other people’s stories, use the Timeline to go back in time, make connections between big events and small across the map. If you know something that happened in Liverpool, put it on!

    whatwasHere.com’s aim is to get everyone – yes everyone – writing history.

    You can follow the project blog at http://blog.whatwashere.com/

    What Was Here interface, November 2006
    (More …)

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  • Tom Goskar 11:32 am on 17 October, 2006 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: , historymatters   

    One Day in History 

    History Matters - pass it on

    ‘One Day in History’ is a one off opportunity for you to join in a mass blog for the national record. We want as many people as possible to record a ‘blog’ diary which will be stored by the British Library as a historical record of our national life.

    Head over to the History Matters – Pass It On campaign website to contribute to a one day “blog” which will be lodged in the British Library.

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    • F.J.B 7:29 pm on 17 October, 2006 Permalink

      Breakfast in bed fruit and yogurt
      Ordered some Christmas gifts from cat.
      Had a shower.
      Phoned daughter in Zurich.
      Dressed went to carpet shop to see samples, only had one.
      Bus to town
      Met a Friend who announced she was going to be a Granny.
      Her other daughter’s boss has just won Nobel prize for medicine.
      I worked as guide in Tenement House, Glasow.
      Met by husband and two grandaughters
      Home to games in our hall and chilli made by husband and Number One grandaughter.
      Walked the girls up to their house.
      Their Dad came home and we had a Pop concert!!!!
      Walked back home and read about this Blog and wrote this.
      Actually quite a great day!

  • Tom Goskar 9:17 am on 11 October, 2006 Permalink | Reply  

    History Matters Campaign “Mass Blog” day 

    History Matters - pass it onThe History Matters – Pass It On campaign, which I blogged about in July, are holding an event entitled “One Day in History” on 17th October:

    A MASS BLOG for the national record. The History Matters campaign has designated October 17 a day for the public to make historic. We have chosen ‘an ordinary’ weekday of no particular significance to ask you to write a one day on-line diary.

    Source: http://www.historymatters.org.uk/output/Page95.asp

    They want people to record a “blog diary” which they can upload to the History Matters website.

    We want as many people as possible – tens of thousands of UK residents – to record a ‘blog’ diary of this one day to be by the British Library and others as a record of our national life.

    As ever, I’m positive about a day where people will record how history has influenced them on an ‘ordinary day’, and have that text lodged with the British Library in perpetuity. But I am uncomfortable about the use of the word “blog” to describe what they’re doing.
    (More …)

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    • Chris Carter 10:36 am on 18 October, 2006 Permalink

      It rained nearly all day where I live in Devon on the 17th of October 2006. I watched it fall as I talked on the telephone (mainly trying to arrange a mortgage for my poorly paid daughter). Two trains of thought kept reoccuring. Firstly that I was glad I had just installed two more water butts on my allotment. Secondly, how amazing that those organising the “mass blog” on this day had completely underestimated the response that it would elicit as evidenced by the slow response of the site. It indicated how little they understood of the web and people.
      CC

  • Tom Goskar 5:19 pm on 20 July, 2006 Permalink | Reply  

    History Matters – pass it on 

    History Matters - pass it onJuly sees the launch of the “History Matters – pass it on” campaign, here in the UK.

    History Matters – pass it on is all about raising awareness of the importance of history in our everyday lives and encouraging involvement in heritage in England and Wales. Our goal is to build public support and interest in looking after our history and heritage – today and in the future.

    There has been a bit of a splash about the campaign after the publication of the results of a Mori poll showed that more people care about history than sport.

    I fully support “History Matters – pass it on”. I’ve even declared my support. They’re asking for people to visit the website and “share your thoughts” by completing a questionnaire, uploading pictures that reflect British history, or take part in a discussion.

    But I think that they are missing a trick or two on the campaign.

    The website is very colourful, complete with smiling photos of Tony Benn and Bill Bryson. But it’s not very navigable. Whilst writing this, I tried to find the discussion forums, but I couldn’t remember where I saw them! After a few minutes of clicking about, I found them, and they were empty. The path to the forum is: Share your thoughts > How history matters to others > Join the debate. At the time of writing, there were 2 guests online, and the forum seems to have disappeared entirely (in Firefox).

    So how do you get involved?

  • Declare your support
  • Give your views on why history matters to you and what you would pass on
  • Have you taken a photograph that captures a moment in history? Or would you like to share a picture of your favourite place? Then, why not upload them to the website?
  • Name your favourite historic place and text it with your postcard to 077717 97777
  • Arrange a History Matters – pass it on event. See our on-line event guide
  • As a web modernist, as well as an archaeologist, I can spot that they’re missing a very big trick. The blogosphere. Websites. Where’s the online campaign?

    As well as contributing to their website, why not provide people with a badge (they give away real badges at their events) to put on their sites (like the Make Poverty History campaign), and encourage people to blog about why history matters to them, and to write about their favourite historical sites that they like to visit. There could be a Flickr group set up, and a special tag for people to use on their photos.

    A few blogs have picked it up already (Technorati search), but by actively encouraging online communities I think that “History Matters – pass it on” could really gain momentum and maximise the campaign’s exposure, which is what it needs.

    It’s a sad fact that heritage, one of the major reasons that the UK attracts tourists from across the globe, is horrendously under-funded, which is a national disgrace. Hopefully, with political pressure, and campaigns like “History Matters – pass it on”, things will begin to change.

    So – if you’ve got this far through this post – please go forth and spread the word! Pinch the badge I made from their logo, stick it on your site, and write about why history matters to you. Declare your support for the campaign, and link to their site, and link to other blogs that are writing about it. Let’s help this move!

    (If you tag your posts or photos, I suggest historymatters as your keyword)

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    • Tehmina Goskar 10:29 am on 23 July, 2006 Permalink

      I couldn’t agree more. As an historian, I believe it is crucial for historical awareness to be at the core of human society. I see historical awareness as ever-increasing circles. First, awareness of your family history, your roots (as multiple as they are), then your street or local area, then your village or city, your region, your country, the countries surrounding yours, your continent, the world. And these should continually adapt as you move and create new homes. These circles don’t diminish in importance as you get further away but they inform one another, give context to one another.

      This campaign does need a better online campaign so we can network better with like-minded people from all over the world who seek to find their many historical contexts. Why should this just be an England and Wales campaign? That is more indicative of the organisations which initiated the campaign rather than about the people. And this is the key to the matter. History matters, people matter. There is no history without people. This is an opportunity to learn from people past and present. In this crazy world, run by the misguided few, we need the masses to join in collectively and publically demonstrating their belief in humanity and this campaign is one way to make a lasting difference. I certainly intend to do my bit online, watch this space in the forthcoming weeks.

  • Tom Goskar 5:23 pm on 3 July, 2006 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: Books, manuscript, , virtualbooks   

    Script Error 

    Script Error

    The Sherborne Missal has had a script error. Oh the irony…

    The Sherborne Missal is a 15th century illuminated manuscript, and the virtual version is available to browse on a large touch screen in the foyer of the British Library. It allows you to ‘turn’ the pages with your hands, as you would a real book. It’s very impressive, allowing you to zoom in on details, and see notes attached to some of the images throughout the book. Unfortunately, it had a little error while I was using it, and my camera was to hand ;-)

    You can view it online as well, via a Shockwave application, as well as many others.

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