DC-MRG THE DIGITAL CULTURES PROJECT:

SUMMER INSTITUTE

 

Archive Cultures: Database Design for Online Collaboration
18-22 June 2001

 
Description:
This is a one-week institute devoted to exploring new research in the design of databases so as to enable online collaboration. We hope the modest scale and informality of this Institute will allow us to blend wide-ranging discussion of the relationship of culture to its archives with hand-on trials of the databases and interfaces developed by our participants. Perhaps this gathering can contribute to expanding the cultural, aesthetic and (progressive) political potential of the database.
 
Links and resouces from the Institute
 
Summer Institute Terms
 
Schedule:
Day:
Activity:
Sunday,
17 June
 
8:00-10:00PM Informal get acquainted cocktail party at the house of Bill Warner and Lizzie MacArthur 2027 Santa Barbara Street, Santa Barbara, CA (805) 569.5636 (Map)
 
Monday,
18 June
 
10:00-10:30: Very brief self introductions by all participants
10:30-12:00: Morning seminar: Matt Kirschenbaum & Kari Krause: "Outside the Archive"
Available in Institute Reader.
12:00-1:00: Lunch
1:00-2:30: Database workshop: George Legrady, "Slippery Traces" and "Pocket Full of Memories"
George will be present a conceptual overview of two works, ‘Slippery Traces’ and ‘Pocket Full of Memories’, offer a explanation of self-organizing maps, and lead a related workshop assignment/project entailing use of Macromedia Director 8.5.
Descriptions of these two projects are in the Institute Reader.
2:30-5:00: Database try and play
7:30-9:30: Dinner downtown: Brigitte's, 1325-1327 State St., Santa Barbara, CA, (805) 966.9676 (Map)
 
Tuesday,
19 June
 
10:00-10:30: Conversation between Dr. Brigitte Steinheider and George Legrady on the inter-disciplinary development of "Pockets Full of Memories"
10:30-12:00: Morning seminar: Geof Bowker & Leigh Star, "It's Infrastructure All the Way Down."
12:00-1:00: Lunch
1:00-2:30: Database workshop: Sharon Daniel and Mark Bartlett, "Subtract the Sky".
Sharon and Mark will provide a conceptual and technical over-view of Subtract the Sky, a collaborative system and web-based authoring environment for the production of "maps." Subtract the Sky relies on the epistemological and aesthetic vectors of cartography, as metaphor and metonym, to produce an archive of alternative histories. The website will provide communities and individuals with a map generation system and communication network, that will allow them to become "cartographers," enabled with the means to re-map the lines of dominance that organize both the social-body and the bio-body. Sharon and Mark will lead a 'participatory design' workshop utilizing the prototype web interfaces, which allow participants to conduct a variety of searches of the site's database and add information to it. The goal of the workshop will be to test the current prototype database and search interfaces and to explore the map authoring process, by manipulating images, sounds, and texts from the database.
2:30-5:00: Database try and play
7:30-9:30: Dinner downtown: Arts and Letters Cafe, 7 E. Anapamu Santa Barbara, CA (805) 730.1463 (Map)
 
Wednesday, 20 June  
10:00-10:30: Review and discussion of "Subtract the Sky"
10:30-12:00: Morning seminar: Lev Manovich's leads discussion of his new book The Language of New Media, focused especially on Chapter 5, "The Forms", 212-285.
Available in Institute Reader.
12:00-1:00: Lunch
1:00-2:30: Database workshop: Robert Nideffer, the Proxy Project
Robert will be providing a conceptual and technical overview of the PROXY mobile agent management (MAM) system. He will lead a related workshop giving participants a chance to use the MAM system while learning how to ingest, define, search, monitor, display and playfully share their personal data in a distributed multiuser environment. The more adventurous will be able to experiment with modifying how the MAM system actually functions. He will also give a sense of future research and development directions.
2:30-5:00: Database try and play
7:30-9:30: Dinner downtown: Arigato Sushi, 1225 State St., Santa Barbara, CA (805) 965.6074 (Map)
Thursday,
21 June
 
10:00-10:30: Review and discussion of "The Proxy Project"
10:30-12:00: Morning seminar: William Warner, "Projects, Questions and Ideas":
1: A Digital Cultures Series for UC Press (Liu and Warner);
2: the "Opening the Folder" conference (Meadow and Warner), March 8-10, 2002;
3: Update on UC Darnet (Daniel and Nideffer);
4: Digital Cultures Graduate Conference, 02.01.02-02.02.02: Digital Utopia?Digital Dystopia: The Rendering of the Artistic Object (Sutton, UC/Los Angeles)
5: Matt Ratto, UC/San Diego, short Dissertation Overview: "Connecting Design Practices to the 'Digital Divide.'"
6: Jeffrey Nyhoff, UCD, short Dissertation Overview
7: "open mike" for ideas, interventions and questions of any kind related to our week's topic.
12:00-1:00: Lunch
1:00-2:30:

Database workshop: Matt Kirschenbaum: "the Virtual Light Box"
I will offer a conceptual and technical overview of the Virtual Lightbox, an open source image-based whiteboard application programmed in Java. The presentation will also serve as an opportunity to discuss other, closely related topics at the intersection of digital imaging and electronic scholarship, from emerging data standards such as JPEG 2000 to the needs and aims of end-user tools.

2:30-5:00: Database try and play
7:30-9:30: Dinner downtown: Bay Cafe and Fish Market, 131 Anacapa St., Santa Barbara, CA (805) 963.2215 (Map)
Friday,
22 June
 
10:00-10:30: Review and discussion of "the Virtual Light Box"
10:30-12:00: Morning seminar:: Mark Meadow, "Back to the Future: Camillo's Renaissance Memory Theater in the Digital Age"
In preparation, you may read Frances Yates, The Art of Memory. Ch. 6: "Renaissance Memory: The Memory Theatre Of Giulio Camillo." In the Institute Reader.
12:00-1:00: Lunch
1:00-2:30: Database workshop: Alan Liu and English Department design team: Database Design for the UCSB English Deparment
Alan Liu, Robert Adlington, and Jeremy Douglass will discuss current projects in the UCSB English Dept. that demonstrate the use of advanced database-to-Web technology in the normal research, instructional, and adminstrative work of a humanities program. The presentation will start with a brief history of the department's interrelated digital projects; focus on current, in-house database development; and then premiere the beta version of the new, SQL Server based Voice of the Shuttle site (development name: "VoS2"). Individual projects will be demonstrated by Adlington (the "Magic Book") and Douglass ("the Desk"), highlighting the relevance of database tech to graduate-student research. The afternoon workshop will give participants a look behind the screen at SQL Server and allow them to field-test VoS2 in preparation for its roll-out, and experiment with the Magic Book and the Desk.
2:30-5:00: Database try and play
7:30-9:30: Dinner/ party downtown: Palace Cafe, 8 East Cota St. Santa Barbara CA 93101 (805) 966.3133 (Map)
 
Institute Participants:
Rob Adlington, English, UC Santa Barbara
Mark Bartlett, History of Consciousness, UC Santa Cruz
Geof Bowker, Communication, UC San Diego
Sharon Daniel, Film and Digital Media, UC Santa Cruz
Jeremy Douglass, English, UC Santa Barbara
Robert Hamm, English, UC Santa Barbara
Matt Kirschenbaum, English, U. of Maryland
Kari Kraus, English, U. of Rochester
George Legrady, Art Studio, UC Santa Barbara
Alan Liu, English, UC Santa Barbara
Enrica Lovaglio, Media Arts and Technology Program, UC Santa Barbara
Lev Manovich, Visual Arts, UC San Diego
Mark Meadow, Art History, UC Santa Barbara
Robert Nideffer, Information Studies and Art Studio, UC Irvine
Jeff Nyhoff, Theater and Dance, UC Davis
Lisa Parks, Film Studies, UC Santa Barbara
Matt Ratto, Communication, UC San Diego
Rita Raley, English, U. of Minnesota/ UC Santa Barbara
Gloria Sutton, Art History, UC Los Angeles
Melissa Stevenson, English, UC Santa
Susan Leigh Star, Communication, UC San Diego
William Warner, English, UC Santa Barbara
 
Media and computer resources for presentations:

We will have the following available for presentations and afternoon workshops: 2 Dell Pentium laptops, Digital Projector, VCR, DVD, overhead projector, slide projector, approximately 14 Dell Pentium 2 and 3 workstations, 2 Dell servers. If an Apple computer is desirable for your presentations, we can rent one per your instructions. We can also link your Apple portable to our local network.

Accommodations :
Best Western South Coast Inn
5620 Calle Real (Patterson & Calle Real: 1 freeway exit from the UCSB campus)
Goleta, CA 805-967-3200 (Map)
 
Directions:

Going from south to north, US 101 passes through the City of Santa Barbara and just east of UC Santa Barbara. To reach the campus, take the UC Santa Barbara/Highway 217. Follow 217 (Ward Memorial Blvd.) to the East Gate of the University. Stop at the gate and identify yourself: parking personnel will provide you with a parking permit and direct you to the parking nearest to South Hall and the Digital Cultures Project. Campus map

From the North, exit US 101 at Storke Road/UCSB exit and drive south (toward the ocean) to a "T" junction with El Colegio Road. Turn left onto El Colegio Road and you will pass through the West Gate of the University: stop and collect your parking pass and directions to South Hall.

Please follow this link for a local area map, inlcuding campus access. For a map of the campus proper, follow this link. (A "scaleable" version of this map is also available in .pdf format.) To find South Hall, Department of English, UC Santa Barbara, locate the bus loop in the middle of the map and walk south (down on this map) between the old gym and Kerr Hall to the corner of South Hall. The Department of English is on the 2nd floor (2607 South Hall). The Transcriptions Studio is at 2509 South Hall. For more detailed directions, including maps, as well as airline, bus, and train connections, please consult the UC Santa Barbara Visitor Center.

 

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