Level: BA/MA
Workload: 5 ECTS
Topic: Digital Humanities/History/Political History
Type: Lecture & Excercise
During the course we focus on historical newspapers as a source for research in history and linguistics. We use Finnish-language and Swedish-language newspapers published in Finland between 1771 and 1929 as a source to study the construction of the nation and development of state structures and how language played part in these and shaped the views of national identity. The course is especially apt for students in digital humanities, history, Finnish language studies and Swedish language. If all participants are comfortable in speaking Finnish and/or Swedish, those will be used as course languages, otherwise the main language of the course is English. The course objectives will further be adapted to the disciplinary backgrounds of the student group.
No special Computer Science skills are necessary. A basic understanding of computers and historical studies as well as the willingness to get involved with new things are good prerequisites. Students are expected to have different backgrounds, which is common in the digtial humanities, and assignments will be adapted accordingly.
- Design and conduct a small scale research project
- Implement qualitative and quantitative methods related to their research questions
- Write an individual essay (max. 5 pages) on digitized newspapers as a source for research
- Do small assignments individually and together with course mates and reflect upon them in written form
- Collect the assignemnts into a portfolio of small research cases relating to nation and state building.
- Understand the different layers present in digital newspaper collections
- Have a working understanding of linguistic annotation conventions in digital corpora
- Are able to evaluate the feasibility of different research projects
- Understand the basic concepts relating to nationalism and nation building
- Are able to fit ideas about language policy developments in their historical, social and cultural contexts.
- Can assess the role of newspapers in nineteenth-century nation building
- Can apply their understanding of linguistic approaches in history to other research topics
The course is build around smaller assignments that are submitted before each meeting. The assigments are designed to feed into an individual essay and a portfolio of smaller studies. Grading is based on the essay and the portfolio. The former is assessed through a round of peer assessments and finally self assessment, whereas the latter is assessed by the teacher. The assessment criteria are povided to students.
Type | Module |
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Virtual Classroom (VC)
| Module 1: Introduction The virtual classroom meeting deals with
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VC & Online self-learning unit (OS) | Module 2: Newspapers as data The virtual classroom meeting deals with
Assignment 1: Literature on historical newspapers Post bibliographic information about two academic texts that are relevant to studying digitized newspapers. The can be about newspapers published in Finland, about the use of newspapers as a source or research papers which use digitized newspapers to make a historical or linguistic case. |
OS | Module 3: Research questions and frequencies Assignment 2: One-page text report on one the texts available in the compiled list of texts. In your report answer at least the following questions: What do the authors want to say with their text? What does the text teach us about the use of newspapers as a source? Assignment 3: The geographical spread of "country side" in Finnish newspapers. Follow the instructions to reproduce a plot about the distribution of the word country side in Finnish newspapers. |
VC & OS | Module 4:Newspapers and nation building The virtual classroom meeting deals with
Assignment 4: Producing absolute and relative frequencies and writing a one-page reflection on the findings. How do the frequency plots reflect historical change, does it matter if you use lemmas or individual word forms, do errors in OCR affect your results? Submit a reflection of max 2 pages. |
VC & OS | Module 5: The state The virtual classroom meeting deals with
Assignment 5: Identify, read and analyze a key text on Finnish statehood by Yrjö Koskinen. Reflect on the possiblity of putting Koskinen's text in a quantitative context. Produce a simple quantitative analysis and try to use that so support your analyss of Koskinen's text. Submit a reflection of max 2 pages. Assignment 6: Write a one-page report on Peter Burke's "Vernacularization and Nation building". |
VC & OS | Module 6:Emergence of the country side The virtual classroom meeting deals with
Assignment 7: Write a one-page report on text by Palander-Collin and Nevala. Assignment 8: The changing country side. Follow the instructions to study the different cases of the word country side over time. Place your findings in context with your findings and reflect on the hypothesis of the collective singularization of the word. Submit a reflection of max 2 pages. |
OS | Module 7:Peer assessment of essays Submit a first version of your essay (max 5 pages). The essays are peer assessed according the the assessment criteria of the course. After peer assessment everyone writes an assessment of their own essay. |
VC & OS | Module 8: Minorities The virtual classroom meeting deals with
Assignment 9: Choose a text based on the assessments and commonly compiled reading list. Write a one-page report on that text. Assignment 10: Trends in the representation of minorities. Make a plan for how to study representations of minorities in newspapers. Using one of the methods deployed in the course, produce one small analysis that would contribute to this hypothetical study. Submit a reflection of max 2 pages including your plan and the smaller analysis. |
VC & OS | Module 9:Final revision of essays and compilation of portfolios The virtual classroom meeting deals with
Return final versions of essays and portfolios |
VC | Module 10: Feedback session Discussion about what the course next year should look like. |
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