Author Archives: alkhatibali

Planning my Omeka Exhibit!!

I think the Lincoln Memorial plays an integral part of shaping D.C, and so I plan on making an exhibit exclusively just for the Lincoln memorial. In my exhibit i will include a modern YouTube video briefly speaking about the Lincoln Memorial and how today it is one of the greatest attractions to tourists from around the world.

To discuss what the statue means and what does it stand for, i will include a copy of a book that describes in details all the major monuments in our capital, from who created the design, to how much the construction costed, and when did the congress agree to pass the proposal of constructing all the different memorials.

I will then move on, or perhaps move back in history, all the way to when the congress put together a committee of artists to choose a location for the Lincoln Memorial, which is where Lincoln sits today, eyeing the Capital that he helped in building and preserving.

A lot of authors have said great things about Lincoln, in this book The Lincoln Room, the author have gone into details about every aspect of Lincoln’s life, his poverty, his presidency, his unfortunate assassination, all the way to where the rocks and granite were brought from to build this great memorial to commemorate such a great person in the history of the United States.

In the exhibit, i would use my google map that i created, to show The Lincoln Memorial along with other monuments and their relative positions in regards to each other.

After presenting all the information, I would also insert pictures of the original design, how it looked when it was first built, and how it looks now.

And then finally, i would end the exhibit with a short essay of what the Lincoln memorial symbolizes and how all of the information provided above comes together, to narrate a whole story about a great man that

“IN THIS TEMPLE
AS IN THE HEARTS OF THE PEOPLE
FOR WHOM HE SAVED THE UNION
THE MEMORY OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN
IS ENSHRINED FOREVER”

 

 

Text-mining tools.

Text-mining tools can be valuable, specially if you’re trying to find the most used words in a text, or you want to be able to see just the text of a said website, or article, instead of having to deal with all the different images and pictures that website might have on their page.

I, myself, found that text-mining was not very helpful to me, and that is because most of the sources that i will be using include pictures that i very much would like to see and use. Also, since my sources are primary sources from say the library of congress and the national archives, most of the time the sources are a digitized copy that i can’t insert in a text-mining tool.

On another note though, the past week have been miserable to me! I lost a dear friend in a car accident, and that just put me in shock, i haven’t been going to school for the past week, and i don’t think i will be going to school next week either. It feels like i was caught off guard, and blows just keep coming this semester.

Google Map

Here the link to my customized Google map with the monuments that i wanted to point to.

google map

 

Creating this map was fairly easy. At first, i was waiting for almost half an hour for google to import all the data from the spreadsheet that i created, to find out later that there was a pop-up blocker preventing it from doing so. After i allowed pop-ups, the whole thing was a piece of cake.

I really enjoyed the idea of marking the map to my specific needs. I was able to add description and pictures and change the marker icons to give each specific location a unique look.

I think creating a map, with your own little description can help in showing how the important monuments kind of encircle the city of Washington D.C within their boundaries. it makes it easier to visualize how much apart are they placed and what do they overlook.Creating this map was very helpful and i will certainly use it as a visual aid to compliment my research.

 

Research Topic

After proposing multiple topics for my research, i think what i would really enjoy writing about and digging more into are all the different monuments that are found in various areas of Washington D.C.

When people visit D.C, the first thing that tells the story of this capital are the monuments. I remember when my family and I first came here as tourists, it was  a pleasure discovering all the different historic areas that D.C has to offer. Now that I am living here, I want to look more into these fascinating monuments. What was the reason behind building each of them? what does each of them stand for? why are they placed where they are placed now? Who designed each monument and how exactly did they build those large monuments back then without the aid of the technologies that we have now?

Those are all interesting questions that still pop up in my mind every time i lay my eyes on one of these magnificent monuments that we have here in our nation’s capital.

 

Calvin and Hobbes Cartoon Images

Copyrights are useful tools for authors to ensure safety of their material. Copyrights give the rights of a specific work to the person who created them, and does not allow other people to use the work of that person without acquiring permission or paying that person for the right to use their work. The digitized Calvin and Hobbes cartoon images that appear on the Assignments tab on the syllabus might be in violation of copyright regulations. The pictures are not claiming ownership of the work, but at the same time it is lacking any indications as to where the picture have come from or who is the creator of the work. Although fair use allows the usage of copyrighted materials for educational reasons, which is the case here, there are guidelines that are required to be followed in order to claim fair use. There is no source to where the comics are coming from, which is why i think this points to copyright violations.

 

Research Topics

vietnam-protest-monument-ap691115062-af53ebb8d60c3b1de5272373ac6eddaa6617b84f-s6-c30Washington D.C is more than just a city, it is more than just the capital of one country, it is more than the center of the federal government. Washington D.C in one way or another, is the center of the entire world. Everybody in the world looks at what Washington D.C is doing, what policies are being created here, what architecture is being built here, how the people are living, and most importantly how this relatively young capital got shaped by its recent history.

one of the interesting topics to discuss about Washington DC is how this great capital, which is the center of the federal government, and several law forcing agencies, has a crime rate so high compared to other cities. Does the city not have enough law men to protect its residents? or is Washington DC not considered a residential area anymore? even though most residential areas have been pushed away from the center of D.C, specifically the national mall, the city is still flooded daily by civilians, from tourists, to local people, to people trying to get their work done with the agencies located in DC, so law enforcement has to be taken seriously, and we have been seeing an increase in law enforcement.

Crime rate brings us up to another interesting topic, does the history of DC that includes battles between federal government and local governments, and people supporting the laws of the federal government and people opposing them, play a role in increasing the crime rate here in DC? is it because the people that are living here are perhaps used to solving their disagreements in a violent way? that is an interesting topic to research a little bit more.

let us go back a little bit in history, around the time that slavery was being discussed widely and movements to end slavery was being established and empowered. How does a city like washington DC, which is supposed to be the unified center of the entire nation, react? where does it stand on such a hot topic? Would it want to stand with one faction of the people against the others? or would that stand dissolve this nation? Looking back at history, when Abraham Lincoln proposed the abolition of slavery, the nation was indeed facing a split that would have ended the united states, but instead, with the formation of the union army, which its main goal was to keep the nation unified, they fought the confederates army which called for separation, and when the union army emerged victorious after 4 bloody years that left more than half a million soldiers dead, the nation was preserved.

last but not least, i would like to discuss how the monumental movement has a lot to do with the beautification of Washington D.C. When you ask a lot of people, what do you think of when you hear Washington D.C, they almost spontaneously answer by: ” the national monuments.” The national monuments give the city of Washington D.C a different aspect that none of the major american cities have, in which those monuments mark specific important events in the history of our nation. the Washington monument for example, remind us of our first elected president. Dr. Martin Luther king’s statue, exemplifies the city’s civil movements. The Lincoln memorial is a beautiful memory of our great standards that was set long ago. and much much more.

Washington D.C is a young city compared to other nations who have existed long time ago, but D.C has a history so deep that makes it a point of interest to a lot of people.marchonwashington_getty

Navigating through primary sources

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Primary sources can be hard to navigate. specially if they are older ones that require close reading and inspection. one of the primary sources that i thought was interesting is the one from The National tribune magazine that was established in 1877 and ran to 1917. the magazine was co-owned and edited by John McElroy who was an american soldier with the union army before starting his printing trade. He had a very clear view of the current issues at the time, and specially about slavery, since in his magazine he clearly condemns slavery and calls it ” a monstrous evil”. He also mentions in his post that a lot thought slavery would last forever, but until it proved to be wrong in many aspects, emancipation was the right choice. the post was published in washington D.C in 1909, which is almost 30 years after the emancipation proclamation was issued by president Abraham Lincoln.

Another primary source that i found interesting was a post from Flickr: The Commons. It is a picture of the installation of the statue of Abraham Lincoln, in our nation’s capital, in the year 1920. The picture was created and shared by the Office of Public Buildings and Public Parks of the National Capital.lincoln The picture shows how Abraham Lincoln is one of the most influential presidents in the history of the United States of America, and that is why his statue is right in the middle of the heart of America’s capital. Although a lot of people didn’t agree with what the President was calling for and standing up for, in the end president Lincoln’s values prevailed because they were the right thing to do.

I did find it more difficult to analyze pictures and photographs than posts and magazines as primary sources, because the producers of the photographs don’t really give any information other than where was the picture taken and by whom it was taken. On the other hand, magazine posts show you a lot more about the personality of the author, his values and what he thinks of whatever he is writing about. Thus, analyzing posts in magazines are way easier to source, contextualize, and close read it.

Evaluating The Price of Freedom: Americans at War.

American-Flag-Eagle The website The Price of Freedom is basically an online museum. It is very interactive and provides a wide range of American History and all the different wars that Americans had to fight in order to gain their freedom.

The Price of Freedom is founded to educate the American people about the price that their ancestors had to pay for them to get to where they we are now. It serves a purpose of reminding them that everything they have now was earned through the sacrifices of the brave people of this country. The website was created by The Smithsonian Museum, the National Museum of History, which by its name only, it shows a lot of authority and credibility.

The website contained a lot of valuable information, but at the same time it fell short in providing in depth stories and resources about whatever subject they were presenting. It brings up the thought that although it is an online museum, it is not as capable of presenting all the information as an actual museum can.

Navigating through the materials of this website was very easy and smooth. It provided a lot of kinds of resources from pictures to writings to pdfs. The website is appropriate for all ages, the learning resource section is specifically geared for grades 5-12. The website employs visual learning so it would be usable for readers and non-readers.

The Price of Freedom is founded by National Museum of American History, and it seems to be a little biased narrating history, as it is told by Americans.

In conclusion, although of this website’s shortcomings at times, overall it is very informative on various aspects of US military history. The site has been updated this past month, and given that it is a history site and the information within it is not subject to a major change,  this indicates a lot of review from the moderators and editors of the website.

Digital Autobiography

The world wide web. What a big creation. Our world has been trying to be connected for quite some time now, and the internet made that humongous world into a small sphere that is very connected and intertwined.

Our every day tasks are all dependent on being connected to each other. The internet is an essential part of almost every institution from schools, to work, to government, etc , all the way to the everyday communication between members of the same family, that are living together in the same household. This brings me up to how the internet plays a major role in my everyday life.

I can’t possibly think of going one day without checking my email. My smartphone is always accompanying me. All i ever need to be connected to the outside world is in that small piece of technology, which ironically enough is not “connected” to anything. It’s mind boggling if you ask me! I use emails mostly for work and schooling purposes. Send and receive up to date information from instructors and bosses, but my real connection to the world lies in the social media aspect.

I belong to multiple social media websites, for different kinds of connection. Facebook is my number one website, as it keeps me connected to the ones i love and care about, whether it is family overseas, old classmates, ex-gfs ( wonder why i have them in my circle if they are supposed to be ex’s, it defeats the purpose. oh well!) and also current friends that i don’t get to catch up with them so often. Facebook gives me almost everything i need to know. Twitter is where i get all sorts of news from locally to globally. following those news channels proved to be a heck of an investment. Lastly, i use the internet for directions!! I don’t think i would’ve survived living in a new area without having my Google maps guiding me every step of the way. Thank you Google, you are a life saver! 🙂

The internet has become an essential part of our lives, and it just keeps getting more and more involved in almost everything. It is a wonderful tool to aid us, if we know how to take full advantage of it, without letting it takes advantage of us.