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Archive for June, 2010
June 30, 2010
Scans and Trainees
I have recently discovered that working in the McCain Building’s lovely EMiC office makes one accustomed to (relative) luxury: plenty of desk space, sleek Mac computers with two screens and the ability to attach the mouse on either the right or left hand side—a war which Vanessa and I wage daily—and natural light. By contrast, the small, enclosed Killam library scanning room and its dinosaur of a PC most definitely constitutes roughing it. Also, the Powers that Be at in the library also need to learn the difference between making a room air conditioned, and making a room into a walk-in freezer. I get odd looks carrying coat, scarf, and gloves to work when it’s 30C outside, but they are all must haves.
All part of the day’s work in the treacherous, thrill-a-minute world of scanning works by Dorothy Livesay!
Last week was a break from the zen-like repetition and solitary pursuit that is image scanning, as we had a few new trainees to the scanning room. They won’t be joining the EMiC team but, as one of the resident scanning “experts” (please note the scare quotes), it was my pleasure to walk them through the process of multiple switches, passwords, finicky focusing tricks, and other preemptive troubleshooting issues. Aside from one light which absolutely refused to function, I think it was a success; teaching it to someone else made me step back to consider the process which has become almost automatic since I was trained back in September.
(Of course, half an hour later, they returned to let me know that they’d likely be using a different scanner after all, but it was fun all the same!)
This week, as the periodical I wanted to scan next was absent from the library shelves, I turned from scanning images to editing some of the scans that Kate and I have spent the last few months compiling. I’ve never used Photoshop before today, but fortunately I remembered something of Macromedia Fireworks from a computer class I took in high school. The clone stamp tool to erase imperfections from the images—of particular use given the age of these texts and the propensity of some people to underline library books in pen—is the same between programs, at least.
Although my focus is on Livesay’s poems and articles within the periodicals, the cover art on some of the issues is lovely. The covers are also the pages most frequently marred with pen or library stamps. Below is one of the images that I tweaked today.
BEFORE: a section of the original, unedited scan:
AFTER: the same section after rotating, cropping, and removing the library mark.
Fairly basic stuff, still, but I’m pleased with how it turned out. If anyone reading this has any Photoshop tips they’d care to share…? Right now, I am still working out some issues of brightness/contrast and the coloration of the scans—some of the originals look a bit washed out, and I’d like to fix that in the edited copies. I’ve tried colour matching to other scans and the results have, so far, been fairly satisfactory, but any other suggestions would be welcomed.
Happy almost Canada Day!
June 28, 2010
TEI, one letter at a time
The project I was working on at DEMiC was a body of correspondence between various figures active in the middle years of the century within Canadian modernism: not only authors but editors, publishers and other figures who participated in the dissemination of modernist aesthetics and artefacts. The letters form part of a volume which currently has the working title Enduring Traces: Correspondence from Canadian Modernism’s Archives, and which I’m still gathering the archival material for. (So if anyone comes across some intriguing correspondence tucked away in an archive somewhere that deserves to come to light, I would be glad to hear about it …)
Below is a little section from one of the letters I was working on, which is from Earle Birney to Alan Crawley:
And here is what it looked like once I’d tweaked the style sheet to work with the letter format:
[If the size is too small to see, click on the images to view them at full size. I haven’t posted them as large images in this post because they crash into the menu at the right.]
This is not a particularly complex document to encode, but all the same, a number of issues came up during the coding, including the following:
– How do you code the date of a letter when its year of composition is unclear, given that TEI insists that you supply at least a year? (In this case it isn’t difficult to figure out what year the letter is written from other contextual evidence, but that isn’t always the case. In a print edition you could presumably just put [1945?] or something similar, and move on, but TEI demands a year.)
– Would readers prefer a text in which wasnt and wont are silently corrected to wasn’t and won’t? Should I bother giving readers the option of toggling errors such as these on and off? (I rather like the way Birney wrote it, but if the original is supplied then it might cause difficulties when text mining down the line, when wasnt and wasn’t might be treated as different words.)
– If some authors italicise or underline titles of books and journals and others don’t, how should this be standardised across different authors? What do readers of an edition value more: the ability to see at a glance which publications are under discussion, or an individual author’s bibliographic habits?
– The xxxx that is used to cross something out after the word moods a few lines from the bottom was a problem that neither Julia nor Martin could solve without the use of XLST. I wanted to be able to include the word that was obliterated in the XML, so that it could if necessary be retrieved, but TEI could not manage it. The compromise was to represent the xxxx as it appears in Birney’s letter, but the way I’ve done it means that the bit of information about what exactly was crossed out has been lost.
As you can see, these are questions which are not just about the mechanics of digital editing but also about the theory of textual editing. I have the feeling historians rather than lit scholars are the ones to ask about conventions for editing documents such as the ones I’m working on … but then they will also see the significance of these letters in quite a different way, so perhaps I should not be seeking their advice …?
Looking at the XML now, I see so many things still to code – there’s not yet an entry in the personography for Jean Crawley; the ‘two letters’ Birney refers to should have a reference, as should the issue number of Q’s Q under discussion, etc etc (and these are quite straightforward and easily tracked-down things, compared to the palimpsest of allusions in the excerpt Vanessa quotes from By Grand Central Station, or the question of how to evade the hierarchical nature of TEI that Bart poses). Much more to do, and this is just one section of one letter!
June 28, 2010
Downtime: editingmodernism.ca
UPDATE: Both http://editingmodernism.ca and http://www.editingmodernism.ca are going to be down for the next 24 hours or so. You can still view the site at: http://lettuce.tapor.uvic.ca/~emic
-admin
June 28, 2010
Versioning Livesay’s “Spain”
G’Day Folks;
I hope you are all finding your way into summer mode since returning from UVic. I had my first lake swim of the summer on Friday afternoon. It was glorious.
I’ve not had a single sighting of a bunny since my return…I got used to them but now they are strange again. Ok; on to DEMiC things…
One of my main interests in approaching TEI and XML is how to present non-hierarchical versions of texts (mostly poems, I guess) within an explicitly hierarchical encoding structure. As a result, I am less interested at this point in the issues of explanatory mark-up and more interested in structural issues.
I figured that Dorothy Livesay’s poem “Spain” would work as a good text to play with and try out multiple methods of editing. After trying a couple of different things, I decided to work with a form of layered parallelisms: at the level of the poem as a whole; at the level of stanzas; and, at the level of the individual line. I took six different versions of the poem and included them all in my XML document:
<body>
<head corresp=”#spain”>Spain<lb></lb>by Dorothy Livesay</head>
<div xml:id=”nf” type=”poem”>
<head><emph rend=”italics”>New Frontier </emph>Version</head>
<lg type=”stanza” rhyme=”aabb”><lg subtype=”quatrain” xml:id=”nfs.01″>
<lb/><l xml:id=”nfl.01″>When the bare branch responds to leaf and <rhyme label=”a”>light</rhyme>,</l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”nfl.02″>Remember them! It is for this they <rhyme label=”a”>fight</rhyme>.</l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”nfl.03″>It is for hills uncoiling and the green <rhyme label=”b”>thrust</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”nfl.04″>Of spring, that they lie choked with battle <rhyme label=”b”>dust</rhyme>.</l></lg></lg>
<lg type=”stanza” rhyme=”aabb”><lg subtype=”quatrain” xml:id=”nfs.02″>
<lb/><l xml:id=”nfl.05″>You who hold beauty at your finger <rhyme label=”a”>tips</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”nfl.06″>Hold it, because the splintering gunshot <rhyme label=”a”>rips</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”nfl.07″>Between your comrades’ eyes: hold it, <rhyme label=”b”>across</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”nfl.08″>Their bodies’ barricade of blood and <rhyme label=”b”>loss</rhyme></l></lg></lg>
<lg type=”stanza” rhyme=”aabb”><lg subtype=”quatrain” xml:id=”nfs.03″>
<lb/><l xml:id=”nfl.09″>You who live quietly in sunlit <rhyme label=”a”>space</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”nfl.10″>Reading the <rs type= “newspaper”>Herald</rs> after morning <rhyme label=”a”>grace</rhyme>,</l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”nfl.11″>Can count peace dear, when it has <rhyme label=”b”>driven</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”nfl.12″>Your sons to struggle for this grim, new <rhyme label=”b”>heaven</rhyme>.</l></lg></lg>
</div>
<div xml:id=”mq” type=”poem”>
<head><emph rend=”italics”>Marxist Quarterly </emph>Version</head>
<lg type=”stanza” rhyme=”aabb”><lg subtype=”quatrain” xml:id=”mq.01″>
<lb/><l xml:id=”mql.01″>When the bare branch responds to leaf and <rhyme label=”a”>light</rhyme>,</l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”mql.02″>Remember them! It is for this they <rhyme label=”a”>fight</rhyme>.</l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”mql.03″>It is for hills uncoiling and the green <rhyme label=”b”>thrust</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”mql.04″>Of spring, that they lie choked with battle <rhyme label=”b”>dust</rhyme>.</l></lg></lg>
<lg type=”stanza” rhyme=”aabb”><lg subtype=”quatrain” xml:id=”mqs.02″>
<lb/><l xml:id=”mql.05″>You who hold beauty at your finger <rhyme label=”a”>tips</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”mql.06″>Hold it, because the splintering gunshot <rhyme label=”a”>rips</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”mql.07″>Between your comrades’ eyes: hold it, <rhyme label=”b”>across</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”mql.08″>Their bodies’ barricade of blood and <rhyme label=”b”>loss</rhyme></l></lg></lg>
<lg type=”stanza” rhyme=”aabb”><lg subtype=”quatrain” xml:id=”mqs.03″>
<lb/><l xml:id=”mql.09″>You who live quietly in sunlit <rhyme label=”a”>space</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”mql.10″>Reading the <rs type= “newspaper”><emph rend=”italics”>Herald</emph></rs> after morning <rhyme label=”a”>grace</rhyme>,</l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”mql.11″>Can count peace dear, when it has <rhyme label=”b”>driven</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”mql.12″>Your sons to struggle for this grim, new <rhyme label=”b”>heaven</rhyme>.</l></lg></lg>
</div>
<div xml:id=”cpts” type=”poem”>
<head><emph rend=”italics”>Collected Poems </emph>Version</head>
<lg type=”stanza” rhyme=”aabb”><lg subtype=”quatrain” xml:id=”cptss.01″>
<lb/><l xml:id=”cptsl.01″>When the bare branch responds to leaf and <rhyme label=”a”>light</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”cptsl.02″>Remember them: It is for this they <rhyme label=”a”>fight</rhyme>.</l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”cptsl.03″>It is for haze-swept hills and the green <rhyme label=”b”>thrust</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”cptsl.04″>Of pine, that they lie choked with battle <rhyme label=”b”>dust</rhyme>.</l></lg></lg>
<lg type=”stanza” rhyme=”aabb”><lg subtype=”quatrain” xml:id=”cptss.02″>
<lb/><l xml:id=”cptsl.05″>You who hold beauty at your finger-<rhyme label=”a”>tips</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”cptsl.06″>Hold it because the splintering gunshot <rhyme label=”a”>rips</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”cptsl.07″>Between your comrades’ eyes; hold it <rhyme label=”b”>across</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”cptsl.08″>Their bodies’ barricade of blood and <rhyme label=”b”>loss</rhyme>.</l></lg></lg>
<lg type=”stanza” rhyme=”aabb”><lg subtype=”quatrain” xml:id=”cptss.03″>
<lb/><l xml:id=”cptsl.09″>You who live quietly in sunlit <rhyme label=”a”>space</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”cptsl.10″>Reading The <rs type= “newspaper”>Herald</rs> after morning <rhyme label=”a”>grace</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”cptsl.11″>Can count peace dear, when it has <rhyme label=”b”>driven</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”cptsl.12″>Your sons to struggle for this grim, new <rhyme label=”b”>heaven</rhyme>.</l></lg></lg>
</div>
<div xml:id=”cvii” type=”poem”>
<head><emph rend=”italics”>CV/II </emph>Version</head>
<lg type=”stanza” rhyme=”aabb”><lg subtype=”quatrain” xml:id=”cviis.01″>
<lb/><l xml:id=”cviil.01″>When the bare branch responds to leaf and <rhyme label=”a”>light</rhyme>,</l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”cviil.02″>Remember them: It is for this they <rhyme label=”a”>fight</rhyme>.</l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”cviil.03″>It is for hills uncoiling and the green <rhyme label=”b”>thrust</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”cviil.04″>Of spring, that they lie choked with battle <rhyme label=”b”>dust</rhyme>.</l></lg></lg>
<lg type=”stanza” rhyme=”aabb”><lg subtype=”quatrain” xml:id=”cviis.02″>
<lb/><l xml:id=”cviil.05″>You who hold beauty at your finger-<rhyme label=”a”>tips</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”cviil.06″>Hold it because the splintering gunshot <rhyme label=”a”>rips</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”cviil.07″>Between your comrades’ eyes: hold it, <rhyme label=”b”>across</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”cviil.08″>Their bodies’ barricade of blood and <rhyme label=”b”>loss</rhyme>.</l></lg></lg>
<lg type=”stanza” subtype=”quatrain” rhyme=”aabb”><lg subtype=”quatrain” xml:id=”cviis.03″>
<lb/><l xml:id=”cviil.09″>You who live quietly in sunlit <rhyme label=”a”>space</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”cviil.10″>Reading the <rs type= “newspaper”>Herald</rs> after morning <rhyme label=”a”>grace</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”cviil.11″>Can count peace dear, if it has <rhyme label=”b”>driven</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”cviil.12″>Your sons to struggle for this grim, new <rhyme label=”b”>heaven</rhyme>.</l></lg></lg>
</div>
<div xml:id=”rmos” type=”poem”>
<head><emph rend=”italics”>Red Moon Over Spain </emph>Version</head>
<lg type=”stanza” rhyme=”aabb”><lg subtype=”quatrain” xml:id=”rmoss.01″>
<lb/><l xml:id=”rmosl.01″>When the bare branch responds to leaf and <rhyme label=”a”>light</rhyme>,</l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”rmosl.02″>Remember them! It is for this they <rhyme label=”a”>fight</rhyme>.</l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”rmosl.03″>It is for hills uncoiling and the green <rhyme label=”b”>thrust</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”rmosl.04″>Of spring, that they lie choked with battle <rhyme label=”b”>dust</rhyme>.</l></lg></lg>
<lg type=”stanza” rhyme=”aabb”><lg subtype=”quatrain” xml:id=”rmoss.02″>
<lb/><l xml:id=”rmosl.05″>You who hold beauty at your finger <rhyme label=”a”>tips</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”rmosl.06″>Hold it, because the splintering gunshot <rhyme label=”a”>rips</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”rmosl.07″>Between your comrades’ eyes: hold it, <rhyme label=”b”>across</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”rmosl.08″>Their bodies’ barricade of blood and <rhyme label=”b”>loss</rhyme>.</l></lg></lg>
<lg type=”stanza” rhyme=”aabb”><lg subtype=”quatrain” xml:id=”rmoss.03″>
<lb/><l xml:id=”rmosl.09″>You who live quietly in sunlit <rhyme label=”a”>space</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”rmosl.10″>Reading the <rs type= “newspaper”><emph rend=”italics”>Herald</emph></rs> after morning <rhyme label=”a”>grace</rhyme>,</l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”rmosl.11″>Can count peace dear, when it has <rhyme label=”b”>driven</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”rmosl.12″>Your sons to struggle for this grim new <rhyme label=”b”>heaven</rhyme>.</l></lg></lg>
</div>
<div xml:id=”sis” type=”poem”>
<head><emph rend=”italics”>Sealed in Struggle </emph>Version</head>
<lg type=”stanza” rhyme=”aabb”><lg subtype=”quatrain” xml:id=”siss.01″>
<lb/><l xml:id=”sisl.01″>When the bare branch responds to leaf and <rhyme label=”a”>light</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”sisl.02″>Remember them: It is for this they <rhyme label=”a”>fight</rhyme>.</l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”sisl.03″>It is for haze-swept hills and the green <rhyme label=”b”>thrust</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”sisl.04″>Of pine, that they lie choked with battle <rhyme label=”b”>dust</rhyme>.</l></lg></lg>
<lg type=”stanza” rhyme=”aabb”><lg subtype=”quatrain” xml:id=”siss.02″>
<lb/><l xml:id=”sisl.05″>You who hold beauty at your finger-<rhyme label=”a”>tips</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”sisl.06″>Hold it because the splintering gunshot <rhyme label=”a”>rips</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”sisl.07″>Between your comrades’ eyes; hold it <rhyme label=”b”>across</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”sisl.08″>Their bodies’ barricade of blood and <rhyme label=”b”>loss</rhyme>.</l></lg></lg>
<lg type=”stanza” rhyme=”aabb”><lg subtype=”quatrain” xml:id=”siss.03″>
<lb/><l xml:id=”sisl.09″>You who live quietly in sunlit <rhyme label=”a”>space</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”sisl.10″>Reading The <rs type= “newspaper”>Herald</rs> after morning <rhyme label=”a”>grace</rhyme>,</l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”sisl.11″>Can count peace dear, when it has <rhyme label=”b”>driven</rhyme></l>
<lb/><l xml:id=”sisl.12″>Your sons to struggle for this grim, new <rhyme label=”b”>heaven</rhyme>.</l></lg></lg>
</div>
</body>
In the back material I included some basic bibliographic material (which certainly needs to be beefed up) as well as a more complex set of link targets that allow for the parallel structure:
<listBibl>
<bibl corresp=”#nf”>
<author corresp=”#dorothylivesay”>Dorothy Livesay</author>
<title>New Fronier</title>
<date>1937</date>
</bibl>
<bibl corresp=”#mq”>
<author corresp=”#dorothylivesay”>Dorothy Livesay</author>
<title>Marxist Quarterly</title>
<date>1966</date>
</bibl>
<bibl corresp=”#cpts”>
<author corresp=”#dorothylivesay”>Dorothy Livesay</author>
<title>Collected Poems</title>
<date>1972</date>
</bibl>
<bibl corresp=”#cvii”>
<author corresp=”#dorothylivesay”>Dorothy Livesay</author>
<title>CV/II</title>
<date>1976</date>
</bibl>
<bibl corresp=”#rmos”>
<author corresp=”#dorothylivesay”>Dorothy Livesay</author>
<title>Red Moon Over Spain</title>
<date>1988</date>
</bibl>
<bibl corresp=”#sis” >
<author corresp=”#dorothylivesay”>Dorothy Livesay</author>
<title>Sealed in Struggle</title>
<date>1995</date>
</bibl>
</listBibl>
<div>
<linkGrp type=”alignment”>
<link targets=”#nf #mq #cpt #cvii #rmos #sis”/>
<link targets=”#nfs.01 #mqs.01 #cptss.01 #cviis.01 #rmoss.01 #siss.01″/>
<link targets=”#nfs.02 #mqs.02 #cptss.02 #cviis.02 #rmoss.02 #siss.02″/>
<link targets=”#nfs.03 #mqs.03 #cptss.03 #cviis.03 #rmoss.03 #siss.03″/>
<link targets=”#nfl.01 #mql.01 #cptsl.01 #cviil.01 #rmosl.01 #sisl.01″/>
<link targets=”#nfl.02 #mql.02 #cptsl.02 #cviil.02 #rmosl.02 #sisl.02″/>
<link targets=”#nfl.03 #mql.03 #cptsl.03 #cviil.03 #rmosl.03 #sisl.03″/>
<link targets=”#nfl.04 #mql.04 #cptsl.04 #cviil.04 #rmosl.04 #sisl.04″/>
<link targets=”#nfl.05 #mql.05 #cptsl.05 #cviil.05 #rmosl.05 #sisl.05″/>
<link targets=”#nfl.06 #mql.06 #cptsl.06 #cviil.06 #rmosl.06 #sisl.06″/>
<link targets=”#nfl.07 #mql.07 #cptsl.07 #cviil.07 #rmosl.07 #sisl.07″/>
<link targets=”#nfl.08 #mql.08 #cptsl.08 #cviil.08 #rmosl.08 #sisl.08″/>
<link targets=”#nfl.09 #mql.09 #cptsl.09 #cviil.09 #rmosl.09 #sisl.09″/>
<link targets=”#nfl.10 #mql.10 #cptsl.10 #cviil.10 #rmosl.10 #sisl.10″/>
<link targets=”#nfl.11 #mql.11 #cptsl.11 #cviil.11 #rmosl.11 #sisl.11″/>
<link targets=”#nfl.12 #mql.12 #cptsl.12 #cviil.12 #rmosl.12 #sisl.12″/>
</linkGrp>
</div>
“s” stands for stanza and “l” stands for line within the “link targets”
Although not written into the XML file, this parallel structure allows for the POTENTIAL versioning of the poem within a web-based interface. In other words, I think I am creating a non-hierarchical BASE for future application. As I said, I THINK I am creating a non-hierarchical BASE… am I?
June 23, 2010
My DHSI project and experience
Now that I’ve finally made it home from DHSI, and had a chance to process the week, I thought I’d share what I was working on in my course, and my thoughts that came out of it.
I was in the TEI fundamentals course, and as I am not currently working on my own EMiC project but working as an R.A. for Zailig on the PK Page project, I decided to mark-up a text that interests me. I ended up choosing the opening page to Douglas Coupland’s seminal novel Generation X.
First page of Coupland's novel "Generation X"
I chose this text for a number of reasons. First, it is one of the main texts for my thesis, which means that I had it with me. But secondly, and more importantly, I chose it because I wanted to figure out how to encode the interesting and unusual non-textual elements on the page. Primarily, the fact that the second paragraph break (line 10) isn’t represented by a line break followed by an indentation. Instead, it is simply notated with the symbol for a new paragraph (¶). (This only happens on the first page of every new chapter, not throughout the whole text). Secondly, I was interested in the photo that is inset into the text, breaking up the text, and even causing a soft-hyphen on the word “transportation.” To me, these two features are essential to the text.
After my DHSI course, however, this is the coding that resulted for this introductory paragraph.
During my course, I asked the professors how I could go about coding these two non-textual elements. The short answer was “You can’t.” TEI is only meant to encode the text itself, and the professors explained that these elements were not part of the text, and therefore had no reason to be encoded. When I pushed them, they suggested that I employ the ‘rend’ attribute to solve my first problem—that of the ¶ symbol. As you will notice in my image, the line that is highlighted contains a new paragraph, with the rend attributes “¶,” “notes-new-paragraph,” and “no line break”. You will also notice that the ¶ symbol does not appear in the text itself, but is simply hidden away in the code. Their argument was that this symbol clearly indicates a new paragraph, and nothing more. While I strongly disagree, I left it as they suggested.
As for the second problem, the professors suggested that I simply pretend that the image doesn’t exist, and remove the soft-hypen from the text. I could always link to a scan of the page, where avid readers could discover the image inset into the text on their own. As you can see from my coding, I decided to leave the soft-hypen in the word “transportation,” but I did not find a satisfactory way to represent that the text was being interrupted by an image.
Although this is a very short text, it taught me a number of lessons about TEI, and about what is currently possible with digitized texts.
1) TEI is, first and foremost, about encoding the ‘text’. While it is possible to encode non-textual elements, there is no agreed upon method. TEI has a very clear hierarchy.
2) Encoding a text in TEI, like all forms of editing, is subjective. It can be deceiving, because there are strict rules on what is and what is not allowed, etc. But in the end, it is not scientific, nor purely objective.
3) Every editor should strive to make his or her editorial method as clear and as transparent as possible. I am not convinced that TEI encoding explicitly allows for this.
4) A good IMT is definitely needed to support the design and layout issues that are not supported by TEI encoding alone. Although I am wary of simply telling readers that everything that isn’t in the TEI encoding can be found in an accompanying marked-up image, it is better than just a TEI encoded text.
So there are my few thoughts. I am anxious to see other EMiC projects as they develop, to see if anyone else encounter similar issues, and how they are resolved.
Cheers.
June 21, 2010
Website Maintenance and Domain Name Migration
Just a heads up that we may be experiencing some downtime in the next few days as I change the nameserver entry to point to editingmodernism.ca. For those of you who may go through withdrawal, I encourage you to use our twitter hash tag (#emic) even more than usual! 
June 21, 2010
nuancing editions
The past week has been a great chance to settle back into life in Halifax (I trust many of you have received emails from EMiC HQ with updates on travel subventions and all that fun stuff) but it has also been a great chance to spend some time digesting and reflecting upon everything I learned and experienced at DHSI. I had a great meeting with Dean and got him caught up on the week’s activities and he mentioned how connected he felt to all of us because of this blog. With that in mind, I want to follow in Melissa and Meg’s footsteps and ensure that we continue to connect through the blog. As we talked about at our Friday wrap-up meeting, we also want to put into place a more standardized system of posting, so that each partner institution has a “turn” taking responsibility to post each week in order to keep this space vital, relevant, and interactive. We are going to draw up a schedule on this end of things but in the meantime if anyone has any suggestions I’d love to hear them! As a final “teaser,” we have designated one hour per week as time for our undergraduate and graduate interns here at Dal to use this “blog” to report on the work they’ve been doing this year– so stay tuned!
One of the things that Dean mentioned he’d love to see more of is people blogging about their specific projects. What projects did we go into DHSI with? Were there specific issues that you went into the course with? What issues came up during your class that may have changed the way you foresee conducting your research?
Here is my “for example.” As I’ve mentioned a few times, I went into the TEI fundamentals course with very little knowledge of anything remotely HTML or XML related, so I brought in simply curiosity as to how learning such languages may affect the way I operated as an editor. As I’ve been working with Elizabeth Smart’s novel By Grand Central Station I Sat Down and Wept, most of my editorial decisions have been based in the editorial theory I learned in Dean’s classes over the years on editions, small presses, and the history of editing practices in Canada. One thing I did not foresee before DHSI was how so many of the self-same editorial theory applies over to coding. The issue of “intentionalist editing,” as just one example, is just as pertinent to those working on digital editions as it is to those working on print editions. I started to become quite fascinated by the changing power-dynamics between the author, editor, and reader in any digital edition and questions of how playful or malleable our new tools make the text are simultaneously exciting and troubling.
The following is an example of an editorial issue that had been sitting on the sidelines of my brain until the TEI course brought it into clear focus:
One of the challenges and joys of working with an author like Elizabeth Smart is the allusive (and thereby elusive) her text is. Metaphors and allegories develop, weave, disappear, morph, and reappear at every turn of phrase or page. One of the extended tropes in By Grand Central Station is that of sacrifice, a trope expressed at times with references to Jesus and at others to the “wandering five million”–the displaced Jewish peoples of war-torn Europe. How does an editor footnote or tag these references? Does one write a detailed critical introduction outlining these issues and then noting whenever they show up? Does one build a narrative through end-notes that accumulates as the reader goes through? When does an editor draw a line between noting a reference? How does one deal with moments in the text which may be interpreted as fitting within a particular reading of the text? These are all issues I have been wrestling with over the years and I found that self-same issue at play in my TEI project.
On the first page of Smart’s novel we find the following paragraph (image is a scanned first-edition of the text):
The section I have issue with is “her madonna eyes, for as the newly-born, trusting as the untempted.” How does one footnote or tag a phrase such as this? First of all “madonna” is not capitalized and therefore I argue that it takes away from the authority of a reference to the Biblical reference. These eyes are “soft as the newly-born,” and such a reference to birth directly after “madonna” suggests to me the first of many references to Jesus in the text. To make it even more complex is the secondary reference to “the untempted.” Smart describes the eyes that belong to the wife of the man the narrator is planning to have an affair with as “trusting” as one who has never been tempted, but how does one read that in reference to Jesus, a figure who was repeatedly tempted? There are a number of interpretations for a section of prose such as this, but where does the onus lie for the editor to make note of such interpretive possibilities? Particularly in a scholarly edition? For the TEI mark-up I chose to tag the text as such:
With the following notes appearing in the “back matter”:
I’m not entirely happy with the results. The challenge that I ended up leaving DHSI considering is how we can possibly build a framework to accommodate for nuance in our texts. I would love to discuss how such nuance challenges us not only as scholars but as editors. How can our new editorial tools help us address such nuance? Could these tools possibly allow for an editorial apparatus that skillfully allows us to navigate or negotiate these nuances? In what ways could they allow for multiple co-existing interpretations? How does a more participatory relationship between reader and text by virtue of such tools allow for a co-existentially nuanced editorial practice?
June 17, 2010
Summary of EMiC Lunch Meeting, June 11, 2010
On the final day of DHSI, EMiC participants gathered for an informal meeting to discuss their summer institute experiences and to plan for the upcoming year. Dean and Mila attended via Skype (despite some technical difficulties). We began by going around the table and talking about our week at DHSI. We reviewed the courses that we took, discussed our the most helpful aspects, and least. The participants who had taken the TEI FUNdamentals course agreed that the first few days were incredibly useful, but that the latter half of the course wasn’t necessarily applicable to their particular projects. Dean made the comment that we should pick the moments when we pay attention, and work on our material as much as possible. Anouk noted the feeling of achievement (problem-solving feedback loop), and her excitement at the geographical scope involved in mapping social networks and collaborative relationships as well as standard geographical locations. It sounds like everyone learned a lot!
We also agreed that there is a definite benefit in taking a course that also has participants who are not affiliated with EMiC; the expertise and perspective that they bring to the table is invaluable.
After our course summaries, we began to think about the directions in which we want to take EMiC. We discussed the following:
1. The possibility of an EMiC-driven course at DHSI next year, which I will be teaching in consultation with Dean and Zailig
a. The course will likely be called “Digital Editions.”
b. It will be available to all participants at the DHSI, but priority registration will be given to EMiC partipants.
c. It will include both theoretical and practical training in the creation of digital editions (primarily using the Image Markup Tool), but also including web design and interface models.
d. We will develop the curriculum based on EMiC participants’ needs (more on this below).
2. Continued Community-Building
The courses provided us with ideas of what we want to do as editors, and allowed us to see connections between projects. The question that followed was how we will work with one another, and how we sustain discussion.
a. We agreed that in relation to the community, how we work together and what our roles are is very important, especially as they related to encoding and archival practice.
b. We discussed how we would continue to use the blog after we parted ways at the end of the DHSI. Emily suggested that we develop a formalized rotational schedule that will allow EMiC participants at different institutions to discuss their work and research. We agreed that we should post calls for papers and events, workshop our papers, and use the commenting function as a means of keeping the discussion going. (Other ideas are welcome!)
c. We discussed other ways to solidify the EMiC community, and agreed that we should set up EMiC meetings at the different conferences throughout the year (MSA, Congress, Conference on Editorial Problems, etc).
3. What’s next?
a. For those of you who are interested in learning more about text encoding, I encourage you to visit the following sites:
• WWP Brown University: http://www.wwp.brown.edu/encoding/resources.html
• Doug Reside’s XML TEI tutorial: http://mith2.umd.edu/staff/dreside/week2.html
b. We are hoping that there will be an XSLT course at the DHSI next year.
c. Next year’s EMiC Summer Institute line-up will include 3 courses: TEMiC theory, TEMiC practice, and DEMiC practice.
d. Most importantly, we determined that we need to create a list of criteria: what we need as editors of Canadian modernist texts. Dean requested that everyone blog about next year’s EMiC-driven DHSI future course. Please take 15-20 minutes to write down your desiderata. If you can, please come up with something of broad enough appeal that isn’t limited to EMiC. (Shout out to Melissa for posting this already!)
As a side note, I spoke with Cara and she told me that there is indeed going to be a grad colloquium next year, which will take place on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday afternoon during the DHSI. Look for a call for papers at the end of summer.
It was lovely to meet everyone, and I am looking forward to seeing you all soon!
**Please post to the comments anything I’ve missed. kthxbai.
June 12, 2010
Digital Archives/Editions: What We Need to Do and What We Need to Know
At today’s EMiC wrap-up lunch, Dean asked us to take 10-15 minutes to write a post about what we need from TEMiC/DEMiC going forward in order to plan and implement our digital projects. What I’ve done–and bear with me, because this is maybe a bit more extensive than what Dean was thinking of–was try to come up with a list of everything we need to think about/know/do in order to create a digital archive or edition, from start to finish. I’m sure I’ve missed quite a lot, and this list is coming out of the project I’m planning (so I’m sure I’ve missed things that you need to consider for your project, or I’ve included things that you don’t need to), but it’s a place to start.
1) The documents we’ll be working with
–Where are they located?
–How many are there? (and therefore, how big the project is and how long it will take)
–Who holds control over access to them?
–How do I get access and permission to publish digitally?
2) Project planning
–What do I want this project to be/do?
–How do I make it be/do that digitally?
–How big is this going to be (#of documents)?
–How long is it going to take to create? What’s my timeline and schedule?
–What do I need to learn?
–What resources will I need?
i) education: TEI, CSS, XMLT, IMT, analytics
ii) time: assessing, scanning, coding, web design, tweaking
iii) tech: oXygen, web editors, computer, hosting site, tech support, OCR program, scanner
iv) money: permissions, hosting, scanning, labour, education, software
v) people: to teach, to work, to listen
–How can I access these resources?
i) At my university-people, physical, and monetary resources
ii) Through EMiC
iii) At DHSI
iv) Through funding agencies and grants
v) My own resources, research, and self-teaching
3) What to do with the documents
–scans that then get OCRed for TEI markup
–300-600 DPI tiff scans that then get marked up in SharedCanvas and used for display
4) Making them digital
–TEI markup for conversion to web format and use with analytic tools (according to a standard schema and limited tag set for EMiC projects)
–image markup for digital facsimiles
–ways of integrating/paralleling the two
5) Making them useable
–converting TEI to functional websites (CSS, XSLT etc.)
–to do this ourselves, or to hire someone?
–getting them online (hosting etc.)
–making them aesthetically pleasing—EMiC-standard web design
–searchability/ analytics/visualizations
6) Making them known
–promoting our projects to the wider community—English scholars and students, digital humanists, general readers
7) How to manage EMiC projects alongside our “official” Master’s and doctoral work
–time management
–working at institutions/with supervisors who are not EMiC affiliated
Now to you–what have I missed? What else do we need to know and do to turn our ideas into realities?
June 11, 2010
IMTweet
#emicClouds
A little DHSI playtime for you. First, two word clouds: one of the DHSI Twitter feed, the other of the EMiC Twitter feed. Both feeds were collected using the JiTR webscraper, a beta tool in development by Geoffrey Rockwell at the University of Alberta.
#emic Twitter Feed in JiTR
How did I do this? First I scraped the text from the Twapper Keeper #dhsi2010 and #emic archives into JiTR. I did this because I wanted to clean it up a bit, take out some of the irrelevant header and footer text. Because JiTR allows you to clean up the text (which is not an option in the Twapper Keeper export) you don’t have to work with messy bits that you don’t want to analyze. After that I saved my clean texts and generated what are called “reports.” The report feature creates a permanent URL that you can then paste into various TAPoRware tools. I ran the reports of the #dhsi2010 and #emic feeds through two TAPoRware text-analysis tools, Voyeur and Word Cloud.
#emic Twitter Feed in TAPoR Word Cloud
#dhsi2010 Twitter Feed in TAPoR Word Cloud
If you want to generate these word clouds and interact with them, paste the report URLs I generated using JiTR into the TAPoR Word Cloud tool.