Tag Archives: Reflections

Wikipedia And The Death Of The Expert

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Before this class I was confused about Wikipedia since some of the professors taught us that Wikipedia is editable from everyone so there can be many misleading. As well there is a bigger number of professors that supports the research in Wikipedia though. From my own experience I have had only positive experience and found only valuable information from it. Now that we have been going through Wikipedia a lot with this class and the information that this article gives to us I strongly agree that it is a great source of information. The article mentions that there is a complex and well stuffed system for dealing with disputes and misleading information in Wikipedia. There are also provided special tools to prevent vandalism. So in shorts there are organized sources that work for accuracy and against edit-warring, sock-puppetry and the like on Wikipedia.

Reflections #8: Mid Semester Course Progress Reflection

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I’m enamored by the growth I can see between myself, and other colleagues when it comes to progress between the mid semester and now. By the mid semester, I was pleased with both the amount of field trips we have taken and the new methodologies for research. Prior to this I was unaware of some of these institutions, such as the NYCHA library in LaGuardia Community College. Within these field trips, we were also asked to find quality sources, relative to our research. I can also say that I was unaware of some of the technologies introduced such as cartodb.com, which I have used heavily for the final project.

Reflections #9: Wikipedia and the Death of the Expert

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“If learners are indeed doers and not recipients, from whom are they learning? From one another, it appears; same as it ever was.” The writer describes the definition of learning to be a two way street, which requires both “doing” and “receiving”. Learners may learn most effectively through interaction and hands-on experience or “doing.” Learners also benefit from other learners, as peer review or presentation is often pondered or “received”.

Wikipedia exacerbates this definition of learning, whereby users of Wikipedia are both doers and receivers. Users of wikipedia may “receive” numerous citations, but most effectively through reading effectively and through editing rigorously or “doing”. One of the comments I found funny, but relative was “How come Wikipedia hasn’t turned into a giant glob of graffiti?” By reading the article, I also learned that nearly two thousand administrators participate in maintaining Wikipedia.

 

Reflections #10: Students can’t access essential research

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While research can be facilitated through the use of “Google”, the quality of research is questionable. “Essential research” or “quality research” on the other hand can only be accessed through privilege. Privilege can be defined by economic and academic status (having financial stability to subscribe to private data hubs, or university journals, databases etc).

Contributing to Wikipedia will enable anyone (regardless of economic or academic standing) to conduct quality research. The greater public will have access to these documents, which are often cited by the contributors. Citations also provide the greater public with access to the agencies in which the documents were derived from.

 

 

05. Using RECAP to evaluate the reading – Eamon Loingsigh The Power of Family Lore: Uncovering Brooklyn’s “Auld Irishtown”

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The things that Eamon talks about in this article are relevant to my topic since he is giving information about Irishtown that later on became Vinegar Hill. This source helps on the research of my assignment but doesn’t fill all my needs. The author and the publisher are trusted sources. The author is a dedicated writer and researcher of this neighborhood.
Eamon comes from the Loingsigh family that has witnessed the history of this neighborhood, the changes area’s names, and the tough times that Americans gave to Irish. The currency of the source information is pretty reliable even though it was published nowadays, the content of it was taken by trusted sources like history books and family personal experiences.
Brooklyn Daily Eagle website is up-to-date source since it is dedicated to write the Brooklyn’s history and everything else that has to do with this borough from 1841. Eamon comes from an Irish emigrant family that moved to Irishtown, Brooklyn, New York in 19th century. His parents and grandparents told him stories about Irishtown, he read books about it and did research online. I looked up some of his sources like the book Gotham and I did verify them.
In that part of Brooklyn were known the neighborhoods like Dumbo, Vinegar Hill, Brooklyn Heights and Navy Yard, but Irishtown wasn’t recognized as an actual place in official records. This made the author to write about it. Creating this source came down to his family, they told him stories about Irishtown. Nobody knew much about it at that time since the computers and internet didn’t exist, so it wasn’t easy to look things up.

04. The First Visit in Vinegar: Site Report #1

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04. The First Visit in Vinegar Hill – Site Report #1

03. Shirley Li – WikiGalaxy: A Visualization of Wikipedia Rabbit Holes

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The name WikiGalaxy is beautifully given to the site and that is very true. I always end up clicking one of those blue highlighted words/links and like many of us I become dependent of the Rabbit Holes. The latest that I was captivated by the Rabbit Hole was when I was reading about Vinegar Hill and Brooklyn. I kept clicking on the highlighted words and it took me by surprise somewhere completely different from what I was supposed to be focused on. So that’s the funny part, that for that first assignment it took me a lot more time then the two preceding assignments combined. The time was longer but worth it since I got to learn stuff that I never heard before or stuff that I always wanted to read about. So my conclusion is that if you have a deadline you should force yourself not to be prey of Rabbit Hole, otherwise open your horizon by clicking those links that interest you.

Hypotheses about Vinegar Hill 1820-1870, Reflection # 5

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Me and my group was given time period of 1820 to 1870, in technological developmental part, we realized that still in vinegar hill houses reflect Italian styles brown stones, iron railings and boot scrapers. We found some signs of ferries paths which were leading to industries as well, some traces of gas lamp and form of electricity  also found. Not only that we also found few transportation development in 1830 by civil and military engineer David Bates Douglas, who introduced traffic sic lanes, one for carts, one for light carriages and third one for pedestrians in two directions. For Civic & Private Organization part we found that the name today Brooklyn used to call “The Government Of Village Of The Brooklyn”. Secondly we found that information they used to capture in Brooklyn library, information like taxes, land record etc.

Archive papers Organization, Materials, and Resources, Reflection # 4

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After reading the articles which were really informative, I will say archives are collections of materials and artifacts kept and preserved by organizations like universities or historical societies. Archival materials are often unpublished and are preserved for their research value. In general just like prof Nora Almeida mentioned in todays class, that archives are consist of records that have been selected for permanent or long-term preservation on grounds of their enduring cultural, historical, or evidentiary value. Archival records are normally unpublished and almost always unique, unlike books or magazines for which many identical copies. To find the archive materials we can go to archive.gov where you can find national archives and much more. Archives can hold both published and unpublished materials, and those materials can be in any format. Some examples are manuscripts, letters, photographs, moving image and sound materials, artwork, books, diaries, artifacts, and the digital equivalents of all of these things. Materials in an archives are often unique, specialized, or rare objects, meaning very few of them exist in the world, or they are the only ones of their kind. The Rober Moses paper are really great example to show that archives are really important, because i think archives really help us to reconnect us with our history, culture and values.