"If the past is to have an abundant future…
then historians need to act in the present."
- Roy Rosenzweig
The dawning of a new digital age brought with it immense challenges for historians and created an atmosphere akin to the wild west. However, the possibilities for completely reshaping the academic world were within reach for those bold enough to attempt to saddle new untamed technologies and pioneer new paths in a modern, virtual, spin on manifest destiny. One such historian was the late Roy Rosenzweig, founder and innovator of the Roy Rosenzweig Center for History and New Media at George Mason University.
Rosenzweig believed that history belonged to more than just academic historians. He felt that history should be accessible to a broader public (@masondevelopment 2019, 0:12). He championed the cause of digital democracy with a goal of “increasing access to historical content, both primary and secondary sources; expanding the range of topics and voices investigated by historians; and allowing nonprofessionals to take a more active role in historical research and debate” and believed that everyone could be a historian (Mintz 2009).
Rosenzweig's background in social history was a key component in these beliefs and the goals he hoped to achieve through his work. Social history looks closely at the lived experiences of individual people and social groups which is uniquely suited to digital history's ability to tell non-linear narratives using interactive and flexible means to wider, more diverse audiences (Cohen and Rosenzweig 2006).
When Rosenzweig started the Center for History and New Media in 1994 out of his George Mason university office, he hoped to create a center that would help the digital humanities break down disciplinary boundaries (@masondevelopment 2019, 2:24). It is this collaborative, interdisciplinary effort that the RRCHNM has benefited most from. While some historians have remained stubbornly mired in the traditional academic environment, the RRCHNM has pushed boundaries by looking outside the field of history and pooling the resources of diverse fields to answer some of digital humanities' biggest questions, find solutions, and move toward the goal of democratizing history. Throughout his work with the RRCHNM he continually looked for opportunities and answers to problems which he foresaw for the new world of digital history and humanities, such as authenticity and durability (Cohen and Rosenzweig 2006).
The RRCHNM has created numerous tools that any historian can benefit from including the research sidekick, Zotero and the collaborative document transcription platform, Scripto. By using Zotero, historians (or any academic researcher for that matter) can easily organize their sources, create annotations in one place that can be easily transferred to other programs, and generate industry specific citations with the click of a button. Not only can this save researchers vast amounts of time, but it can also ensure that sources are easy to find for future work. That efficiency can lead to more time spent offering analysis and interpretation rather than formatting citations. Scripto is another fantastic tool for historians that enables digital forms of primary sources to be organized in one place that is accessible to a collective community to be transcribed. This team effort is incredibly important in our era of source “overload” that often plagues underfunded projects. Allowing for collaboration in transcribing documents is something that many large archives (including the National Archives and Records Administration) have turned to with great success. Additionally, Scripto uses community editing and feedback to provide a “peer review” element to ensure that transcriptions are as accurate as possible. Once sources have been transcribed, they are easier for researchers to work with.
Two exciting projects brought to life by the RRCHNM are Teaching History and Eagle Eye Citizen. Both projects are valuable resources that I have seen in use in conjunction with Orange County Public School social studies curriculums to bolster state materials in ways that expand students’ skill sets into those of historians. As opposed to just rote memorization of information, these projects help to engage students with primary sources through interactive platforms. Teaching students the skills of research, analysis and interpretation early ensures that they can carry those skills with them into other areas of their lives. These critical thinking skills are increasingly important as the digital world has made it more and more challenging to sort fact from fiction.
It is clear that Roy Rosenzweig's legacy will live through the RRCHNM as the center continues to look for new and innovative ways to increase the accessibility of the field and realize their founder’s dream of the democratization of history.
Bibliography
@masondevelopment. George Mason University. "Democratizing History - Roy Rosenzweig Center for History and New Media." YouTube Video, 6:27, October 18, 2019, Democratizing History - Roy Rosenzweig Center for History and New Media
Cohen, Daniel J. and Roy Rosenzweig, "Introduction: Promises and Perils of Digital History," in Digital History: A Guide to Gathering, Presenting, and Preserving the Past on the Web. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2006. Accessed January 17, 2023, https://chnm.gmu.edu/digitalhistory/introduction/
Mintz, Steven. "Roy Rosenzweig and the Future of the Past." Intersections: History and New Media 47, no. 5 (May 1, 2009): https://www.historians.org/research-and-publications/perspectives-on-history/may-2009/roy-rosenzweig-and-the-future-of-the-past
O'Malley, Michael and Roy Rosenzweig. "Brave New World or Blind Alley? American History on the World Wide Web." Journal Of American History 84, no 1. (June 1997): https://rrchnm.org/essays/brave-new-world-or-blind-alley-american-history-on-the-world-wide-web/
Our History - RRCHNM." Roy Rosenzweig Center for History and New Media. January 2023. Accessed January 25, 2023. https://rrchnm.org/our-history/
Rosenzweig, Roy. "Can History be Open Source? Wikipedia and the Future of the Past." The Journal of American History 93, no 1 (June 2006): 117-46. https://rrchnm.org/essays/can-history-be-open-source-wikipedia-and-the-future-of-the-past/
Rosenzweig, Roy. "Scarcity or Abundance? Preserving the Past in a Digital Era." American Historical Review 108, no. 3 (June 2003): 735-762. https://rrchnm.org/essays/scarcity-or-abundance-preserving-the-past-in-a-digital-era/
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