Ordinarily, we use this week to talk about citation managers. We’re still going to do that. But I want to take a little bit of time to think about how the Internet can make source reliability challenging, and how we can get around it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“How Can I Fight Fake News?”<\/a>, Advice for\/from the Future<\/em>. (Images and transcript here<\/a>.) (Responses: blog post, audio)<\/p>\n\n\n\n Walk through this activity<\/a> about deepfakes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Then, in your group, answer these questions together:<\/p>\n\n\n\n When you’ve come to a conclusion about these questions, one member of the group should post in the main #week4 channel on behalf of the group. <\/p>\n\n\n\n One of the ways that false news gets spread on the Internet is by bots. But bots can sometimes be channeled to good purposes. Read this article by Caleb McDaniel about a historical Twitter bot<\/a> he created, then think through how something like Twitter bots might be used to spread good, or at least spread truth. Then consider building one of your own about the subjects of this class (which could be your conflict or something related to the tech we’re learning about). You can do this individually or in your group.<\/p>\n\n\n\n If you do build a Twitter bot individually about your conflict, you could potentially count it as Project #7. Submit it to me when it’s done and we’ll talk through what you’ve done.<\/p>\n\n\n\n If you’re feeling confident that you can spot deepfakes, how about trolls? Do this activity<\/a> to see if you can figure out how to determine what social media accounts are real and what accounts are designed to inflame emotions. <\/p>\n\n\n\n After you’ve done this, write a short blog post<\/strong> reflecting on social media: what makes it worthwhile? what harm can it do (especially in a moment where partisan tensions are high)? Write about rules you have or might want to institute for your own social media usage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In your post, also consider the challenges a historian might have when writing about the 21st century. How might a historian be able to use social media content to write the history of our time? What can it tell us about our time? What can’t it tell us?<\/p>\n\n\n\n Sources are a critical part of the historian’s work. We cite from both secondary and primary sources (sources from other historians and sources from the time period we’re working on). Sources are what make or break a historian’s argument. But not every source is created equal (just like not every social media account is created equal). It’s important to understand whether our sources are reliable, and it’s equally important to cite the sources that we use. So today our work is all about reliability and citation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Listen to the podcast here, or read the transcript<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\nIn class today: <\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Thursday<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Blog post<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
Sources<\/h3>\n\n\n\n