AUTHOR: CLAUDINE CHIONH Public history is a field that seeks to return the study and interpretation of history to the wider community. While 'professional' historians with academic training may be involved, public history is largely focused on and driven by 'amateurs' – genealogists, local history societies and others who collect and collate sources and interpret and present them for a general audience. The increased use of the internet in recent years has created new opportunities for opening up sources and archives to the world, and for collaboration and public presentation of historical research. In this presentation I will describe two projects that aim to collect and publish historical sources on the web and to work with local and family historians to maintain these as dynamic historical resources.

1. Public history in the digital age
Claudine Chionh
University of Melbourne
linux.conf.au, January 2009

2. This talk
Founders and Survivors: Transportation to Van Diemen’s Land
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Goulburn Valley local history
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3. ‘Professional’ and ‘amateur’ historians

4. Founders and Survivors
http://www.foundersandsurvivors.org/

5. Archival sources

6. Extending the archive

7. Goulburn Valley local history

8. WikiNorthia
Collaborative history of Melbourne’s northern suburbs
http://www.wikinorthia.net.au/

9. Why MediaWiki?
Success of Wikipedia
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API
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Extensibility
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10. Culture
No matter how simple something looks, someone will find it
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difficult
Fear of new technology
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Lack of awareness of privacy and copyright issues
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Role of public libraries
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11. Gedcom
0 @I1@ INDI
1 NAME Bob /Cox/
1 SEX M
1 FAMS @F1@
Convert to SQL or XML?

12. Ownership
Who owns collections?
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Who owns historical interpretations?
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Who reads the fine print anyway?
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13. Contact
claudine@chionh.org
Photo credits
Goulburn River
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http://www.flickr.com/photos/outbj/241042582/