This document discusses using linked open data for digital humanities research. It describes how linked data allows integrating different datasets in a flexible way to enable cross-collection, institution, and domain collaboration. Linked data uses web standards like URIs, RDF, and SPARQL to structure data in a way that is machine-readable. This overcomes issues with traditional human-readable documents by enabling data linking and analysis. Examples discussed include linking historical datasets about Dutch ships and sailors as well as linking media datasets for event-based browsing and exploration by media historians.

1. Linked (Open) Data
for Digital Humanities
Big Data in Society
2016 Amsterdam Summer school
Victor de Boer
With input from Christophe Guéret, Serge ter Braake,
Niels Ockeloen, Antske Fokkens, Dirk Roorda, Lora Aroyo, Johan
Oomen, Oana Inel, Jan Wielemaker, Jeroen Entjes

2. Victor de Boer
Web & Media Group, CS, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam
Netherlands Institute for Sound and Vision
Linked Data for Cultural Heritage
Linked Data for Digital History
Linked Data for Development

3. Digital Humanities
Part of the effort of researcher is moved
from the physical archives to digital ones
Img:www.doaks.org,www.dkrz.de
Cross - researcher
- institution
- project
- domain collaborations

4. “Digital History”
http://armstrongdigitalhistory.org/, http://www.vcdh.virginia.edu/courses/fall07/hius401-f/,
http://digitalhistory.unl.edu/essays/thomasessay.php, http://www.philipvickersfithian.com/2013/05/gender-in-stacks-on-managing-small.html

5. “That is great. I would love that…
…but my research questions are slightly different.”
Img:Monty Python

6. Aging
Data Tool
C.Guéretbasedonhttp://redmonk.com/jgovernor/2007/04/05/why-applciations-are-like-fish-and-data-is-like0wine/

7. Data as end-product
Do not bake the data into the tool
Build tools on top of the data.
Make sure others can do so as well.
Fig: C. Guéret

8. Linked Data
The best way to expose your data?

9. Machine-readable Web
Humans are very good at reading (web)
documents and distilling information
Computers are good at calculating, combining and
filtering information. But they are very bad at
reading documents
We need to write down (web) data, information
and knowledge in a way that machines can
understand

10. Web of Documents (WWW)
Linked Documents

11. Web of Data
Linked Data

13. http://info.cern.ch/Proposal.html
Tim Berners-Lee
(The inventor of the Web)
And the Semantic Web

14. BIG ? LINKED? OPEN?

15. BIG DATA
LINKED DATA
OPEN DATA

16. Four V’s of Big Data
http://www.ey.com/GL/en/Services/Advisory/EY-big-data-big-opportunities-big-challenges

17. BIG DATA
LINKED DATA
VARIANCE as one of the V’s of
Big Data
VOLUME, VELOCITY are
challenges for LD

19. LINKED DATA
OPEN DATA
LINKED OPEN DATA
as the way to publish and reuse
datasets across the Web

20. www.w3.org/designissues/linkeddata.html

21. http://lod-cloud.net/

22. How does all this work?
Data, not documents
Structured data
Graph (networked) data!
W3C Web standards stack
URIs, HTTP, RDF, RDFa, RDFS, OWL, SPARQL,
etc.

23. Four rules of Linked Data
1. Use URIs as names for things
2. Use HTTP URIs so that people can look up
those names.
3. When someone looks up a URI, provide useful
information, using the standards (RDF)
4. Include links to other URIs. so that they can
discover more things.
http://www.w3.org/DesignIssues/LinkedData.html

24. Use HTTP URIs for Things
Uniform Resource Identifier (URI) used
to identify a name of a resource
http://rijksmuseum.nl/data/painting1
I can go there using HTTP (dereference) and
then I get information about it
HTML page for humans
RDF data for machines

25. Semantic Web standard for writing down data, information
(Subject, Relation, Object)
<Painting001, has_location, Amsterdam>
Resource Description Framework
(RDF)
Painting001 Amsterdam
has_location

26. Triples reusing the same URIs form Graphs

27. Linked Data for E-science:
OpenPHACTS

28. But what about the humanities?
Two examples
Digital History and Media studies

29. Dutch Ships and Sailors

30. The Problem:
((Maritime) historical) data is not integrated

31. KB NEWSPAPERS
Dutch-Asiatic Shipping“VOC Opvarenden”
Jur Leinenga Matthias van Rossum
Elbing voyagesArchangel voyages

32. DIFFERENT but LINKED DATAMODELS BASED
ON COMPETENCY QUESTIONS
dss:Record
gzmvoc:Telling
gzmvoc:telling-1046-De_Berkel
__bnode_1
gzmvoc:aziatischeBemanning
dss:Ship
gzmvoc:Schip
gzmvoc: schip-1046-De_Berkel
dss:has_ship
gzmvoc:schip
"1046"
“Schip”
“De Berkel”
rdfs:label
dss:scheepsnaam
gzmvoc:scheepsnaam
dss:ShipType
gzmvoc:Scheepstype
gzmvoc: type-Ship
dss:has_shiptype
gzmvoc:has_shiptype
gzmvoc:scheepstype
“21”
“Moorse
mattroosen”
dss:azRegistratieKop
gzmvoc:azAantalMatrozen
gzmvoc:telling
gzmvoc:heeft DAS heenreis
dss:Record
das:Voyage
das:voyage-1918_61

33. mdb:Schip1 mdb:Kof
mdb:scheepsType
das:ShipX das:Kofship
das:typeOfShip
Aat:Kof
Aat:Platbodems
skos:exactMatch
skos:exactMatch
skos:exactMatch
Link to other datasets

34. Links to Historical Newspapers
published by Royal Library
- Andrea Bravo Balado

35. Identifying ships
Rather than irreversible normalization, we
can add (sameAs) links
– Robin Ponstein
mdb:Alberdina1 mdb:Alberdina2
owl:sameAs

36. Provenance (1)
Individual named graphs have provenance
information
Who made it (people/software?)
Based on what source
Content confidence
Prov-O vocabulary

37. hasOriginalScan
Provenance (2)

38. HTTP://SEMANTICWEB.CS.VU.NL/DSS

39. Data analysis and visualisation

40. DIVE INTO THE EVENT-BASED
BROWSING OF LINKED HISTORICAL MEDIA

41. MEDIA HISTORIANS AND RESEARCHERS
MediaresearcherLarsArveRøsslandoftheUniversityofBergen.(Photo:AndreasR.Graven)
EXPLORATORY SEARCH
Digital Hermeneutics: The combination of digital
(Web) technology and theory of interpretation

42. Four
data sources
OPENIMAGES.EU 300 News videos
(1920s-1970s)
DELPHER Radio News Bulletins
2210 Scripts (1945-1985)
AMSTERDAM MUSEUM
3541 Objects (1950-1989)
TROPENMUSEUM ~3000
objects (20th C)

43. ENTITY EXTRACTION
CROWDTRUTH.ORG
ENTITY EXTRACTION
EVENTS CROWDSOURCING AND LINKING TO
CONCEPTS THROUGH CROWDTRUTH.ORG
SEGMENTATION & KEYFRAMES
LINKING EVENTS AND
CONCEPTS TO KEYFRAMES

44. LINKED DATA KNOWLEDGE GRAPH
DIVE:MEDIA OBJECT SEM:EVENT
SEM:PLACE
SEM:TIME
SEM:ACTOR
SKOS:CONCEPT
OA:ANNOTATION
PLACE
PLACE

45. DIGITAL SUBMARINE UI
https://www.flickr.com/photos/benjcarson/245171885
https://www.flickr.com/photos/mibuchat/2774251415
INFINITY OF EXPLORATION

46. “DIGITAL SUBMARINE” INTERFACE
DIVEPLUS.BEELDENGELUID.NL

47. Linked Data allows for new types
of (Humanities) research
• Graphs, not tables
• Distributed, heterogeneous data
• Integrate datasets in a flexible way
• Cross-collection, -institution, -domain
• Re-use background knowledge
• Provenance fits very well
• Linked Data is the (technically) best way to publish
and share your research data

48. Thank you!
Victor de Boer
http://victordeboer.com
v.de.boer@vu.nl