The NULab and the Digital Integration Teaching Initiative have developed this toolkit to serve as a collection of resources for tools that can be used to share, preserve, and celebrate local stories and heritage materials. The tools below all are free or have free versions, and none of them require Northeastern University credentials. The slide sets, handouts, and examples are all shared under a Creative Commons Attribution–NonCommercial–ShareAlike license, which means that you are free to adapt and re-use them, but not to sell or republish them under a different license. We are hoping that these resources will be useful in a few contexts:
- For self-directed individual learning
- For community organizations considering their options for creating digital publications or starting digital projects
- For classes that involve community collaborations
Most of this guide is organized by specific tools, but we have also collected some general resources—if you are just getting started with thinking about community-based digital projects, we’d encourage you to begin by reviewing the materials in this section. Please note that this toolkit focuses on free and lightweight digital tools for sharing heritage materials and is not intended to be a comprehensive survey of options for building digital projects. See the NULab’s resources page for a fuller set of tutorials, datasets, and guides.
Please send us any feedback you might have on ways this toolkit could be more useful!
General resources:
The resources in this section are relevant for many different kinds of digital publications and tools:
- Data privacy handout: this handout outlines some important considerations for using free online tools that involve signing up for accounts.
- Accessibility handout: this handout shares some good starting points for ensuring that digital publications are accessible to readers with all kinds of abilities.
- Copyright and fair use handout: this handout provides instruction for re-publishing digital media objects, shares resources for finding content you can use, and covers best practices for using content created by others.
- Data ethics handout: this handout shares considerations and best practices for creating, manipulating, and performing research with data, especially data involving people.
- HTML Handout: this handout explains how to get started with HTML for website building.
- Archives and Special Collections in the Northeastern University Library collaborates with community members on many projects and they also offer workshops and opportunities to teach with the Archives collections. They also publish useful resources such as a Zotero library, and the white paper “Principles of Anti-Oppressive Community Engagement for University Educators and Researchers” by Rebecca Riccio, Giordana Mecagni, and Becca Berkey.
- The Digital Transgender Archive has published a Harm Reduction Guide that shares many useful principles and questions that projects planning to publish information about individual persons might consider.
StoryMap
StoryMap is a user-friendly platform published by Knight Lab for creating “story maps,” or maps that combine a narrative with geographic locations. StoryMap can be used for many purposes, including research projects, community narratives, and even personal planning (map a road trip or your favorite restaurants!). It can contain audio, video, and other forms of embedded media, making the final StoryMap interactive and easy-to-understand for different types of readers.
Resources for learning and teaching StoryMap:
- Meet the Method: StoryMap post describing Claire Lavarreda’s process for creating a StoryMap about the Black Jazz Heritage trail of Boston
- Meet the Method sample StoryMap, The Black Jazz Heritage Trail of Boston, by Claire Lavarreda
- StoryMap slides
- Introduction to StoryMap handout
- Accessibility in StoryMap handout
- Activity: Boston’s Black Heritage trail
- Example StoryMap projects:
- Harrison Beiser, Kayla Lavelle, and Shira Weiss, Mapping Shared Spaces: A Visual History of Boston’s Black and Jewish Communities
- Nicole Duffe, The Passive House Movement in Massachusetts
- Sabrina McClain, Climate Adaptation and Environmental Justice in Boston MA
Google My Maps:
Google My Maps is a user-friendly tool for adding locations and routes to Google Maps. With this tool, you can publish maps showing different points, neighborhoods, and paths—giving these descriptions and adding images, videos, or other media. Google My Maps is a great resource for creating maps that people can use to navigate physical locations while learning about their histories and communities.
Resources for learning and teaching Google My Maps:
- Meet the Method: Google My Maps post describing Emily Sullivan’s process of mapping vegan and vegetarian restaurant options throughout Boston.
- Meet the Method sample Google My Map, A Vegan’s Guide to Eating in Boston
- Google My Maps slides
- Example Google My Maps projects:
- Claire Lavarreda, The Black Jazz Heritage Trail of Boston
- Colleen Nugent, Boston’s Black Heritage Trail
Audacity
Audacity is a free audio recording, editing, and mixing tool that can be used for recording oral histories, podcasts, music, local soundscapes, and more. With this tool, you can explore community history in a variety of ways and make this history accessible to the public. For example, interviews with community elders, the sounds of your neighborhood, and podcast episodes addressing current events are all possibilities with Audacity.
Resources for learning and teaching Audacity:
- Meet the Method: Audacity post describing Emily Sullivan’s approach for recording and editing her family’s oral history through interviews.
- Meet the Method sample podcast on Emily’s family’s oral histories
- Audacity for Oral Histories slides
- Introduction to Audacity handout
- File organization in Audacity handout
- Example Audacity projects:
- Claire Lavarreda and Catarina Tchakerian, Unfinished History Podcast
- Claire Lavarreda, How We Remember: Oral History Archive
Timeline
Knight Lab Timeline is an open source tool in which users can create interactive timelines. This tool makes it easy to create interactive timelines with images and videos just using a Google spreadsheet. For example, you can trace the history of a community organization, examine a present-day issue in depth, and create future steps and deadlines for your research with Timeline.
Resources for learning and teaching Timeline:
- Meet the Method: Timeline post describing Claire Lavarreda’s project of creating a Maya Angelou bibliography with summaries from her publisher, Penguin Random House.
- Meet the Method sample timeline, Maya Angelou’s Autobiographies, by Claire Lavarreda
- Timeline slides
- Timeline handout
WordPress
WordPress is a free and open source content management system (CMS) that allows users to create personalized websites, blogs, portfolios, and forums. WordPress enables you to present yourself, your work, and your community in many creative ways. Photos, videos, art, text, documents—these are all things that a WordPress site can contain.
Resources for learning and teaching WordPress:
- Meet the Method: WordPress post describing Emily Sullivan’s process of creating an informal photo gallery on WordPress that captures ten years of moving through spaces in Rhode Island.
- Meet the Method sample WordPress site: A Rhode Island Gallery, by Emily Sullivan
- WordPress slides
- WordPress handout
- Example WordPress projects:
- Kasya O’Connor Grant, The Battle of the Bogside in Three Parts
- Laurel Schlegel, Escaped Ads New Hampshire
- Introduction to Shakespeare, Erika Boeckeler, Spring 2020, Fall 2020, Fall 2021, Spring 2023, Fall 2023, and Renaissance Literature: Shakespeare (graduate level) Fall 2023: Merchant of Venice digital edition
Learn More
While this guide has focused on free and easy-to-use tools, there are many other possibilities for archiving, preserving, publishing, and sharing heritage materials—including platforms such as Omeka, Mukurtu, Scalar, and ArcGIS StoryMaps. To learn more about these, see the NULab’s resources page, the DITI’s full set of teaching resources, and the Northeastern Library’s guides to getting started with GIS, data visualization, and text and data mining.
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Type of Program
- Graduate Program
- Undergraduate Program
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Links and resources
- Statement on Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging
- Faculty Partnership Guidelines
- Sample Course Modules
- Available DITI Tools
- GitHub Repository
- Sample Student Work
- Glossary of Terms
- Call for Partnerships
- Data Considerations
- Teaching Resources
- Digital Toolkit for Community Projects
- Sample Faculty Teaching Materials