Digital Matter and Intangible Cultural Heritage

Anthropology, Design, General

Call for Papers

International Journal of Digital Cultural Heritage and Electronic Tourism

Special Issue

Editors: Prof. Lily Díaz-Kommonen
Maurizio Forte, PhD
Deadline for submitting abstracts: August 17, 2007
All final papers are due: September 28, 2007

In recent years, partly through the development of the Information Society with its associated trends of globalization, growing interconnectedness, and instant multi-modal communications that erode the boundaries of traditional societies, the concept of cultural heritage has evolved to encompass qualities that go beyond the original definitions pertaining the mere recording and preservation of cultural objects. Within the scope of UNESCO’s activities for example, the agency now recognizes cultural heritage as an irreplaceable source of knowledge with a significant role to play in the present as part of the goal towards a sustainable future.

From a knowledge management perspective UNESCO’s work has also expanded to include the two major classes of tangible and intangible heritage. Whereas tangible heritage includes the multiple physical expressions created by diverse human cultures in the past, intangible heritage-also referred to as living heritage-is used to designate present “practices, representations, expressions, as well as the knowledge and skills, that communities, groups and, in some cases, individuals recognize as part of their cultural heritage.”

The objective of this special issue will be to explore the notion of intangible heritage and its relationship with the digital media. From this perspective, we seek contributions related to the following topics:

1. Definition, analysis and examples about the notion of intangible digital cultural heritage from the artistic, scientific, and economic perspectives.
2. Ecological and systemic approaches that make use of digital cultural heritage-and specifically intangible heritage-for economic revitalization and development.
3. Design and implementation of digital applications for intangible heritage such as digital and multimedia archives dealing with oral traditions, narratives and myths from different regions throughout the planet.
4. Research into digital genres and how these might support and enable the transmission of diverse forms of intangible heritage as well as promote the creation of new ones.
5. The representation of space and cultural heritage through the use of digital media, including but not limited to the combined use of GIS and mobile devices.
6. Ontology design and implementation in digital cultural heritage applications from a cross-cultural and multiplatform application perspectives.
7. Explorations into the notion of heritage commodities and how these are being used, or can be used in the digital environment.
8. Application design, including but not limited to portals dealing with the commercial development of heritage commodities such as cuisine, knowledge, music, etc.
9. The use of peer-to-peer networks in the creation of virtual cultural heritage communities.
10. New applications of digitally born cultural heritage objects in within tangible public exhibition spaces.

Dr. Lily Diaz-Kommonen
Professor, Systems of Representation
& Digital Cultural Heritage
UNIVERSITY OF ART & DESIGN HELSINKI, MEDIA LAB
135C Hämeentie SF 00560
Helsinki, Finland
Tel. + 358 9 75630 338
Fax + 358 9 75630 555

e-mail: diaz@uiah.fi

Maurizio Forte, PhD., Senior Scientist, Coordinator of Virtual
Heritage lab
CNR – ITABC, ISTITUTO PER LE TECNOLOGIE APPLICATE AI BENI CULTURALI
Area della Ricerca Roma 1 – Montelibretti
Via Salaria Km. 29,300 – C.P. 10
00016 Monterotondo St. (ROMA)

Tel. ++39 06 90625274
Fax ++39 06 90672373

e-mail: maurizio.forte@itabc.cnr.it

To read more about the Journal.
To see the submission guidelines.

A space for storytelling

Design, General

Two weeks ago, I had the opportunity of attending the Alpine-Rendevouz held at the village of Villars in Switzerland. The meeting was a combination of workshops and doctoral schools organized by the Kaleidscope network of excellence.

My attendance was motivated by an invitation to participate in a workshop about the Classroom of the Future, led by Kati Mäkitalo-Siegel and Frederick Kaplan. Aside from giving presentations on our topics–mine was about Cultural Heritage in the Curriculum, Case Study Exploring Carta Marina–we had an opportunity to work on a design for the Classroom of the Future.

I proposed to my colleagues that we should design a space for the sole purpose of telling stories. Here is a picture of our final design, or Storytelling Room (the second from top), as reported in the Kaleidoscope network news. I would love to continue working on this project, so if there is anybody out there interested… Let me know!

– Lily

Who is that girl?

America, Art, General

yasuri.jpg

“My name is Yasuri, Yasuri Yamileth… I live in el Chorillo with my eight kids eating sausage and hang out at Veranillo…”

This is a Panamania model who claims to be “the Real Yasuri Yamileth”, interpretant of the summer hit of 2006 in Venezuela, that incidentally was not picked up by the Latin Grammy Awards but whose signal was potent enough to be heard by the Nordiscope. Would the fact that it is posted in the Wikipedia, and that the lyrics of the song are written in both Spanish and English on this website give her claim more strength? (e.g. Does she look like a “Yasuri Yamileth, the mother of eight” to you? What does this say about double standards and the image of women in society, huh? And about Wikipedia?)

Here is a link to the award-winning Yasuri Yamileth performance that won kudos, hate comments, and declarations of love for the diva on the Internet! (Note that the original one, which had over 500,000 hits cannot be found anymore on the web.)
So far the native country and identity of the performer is subject to debate (Panamá? Venezuela?). It has been said that “We are All Yasuri Yamileth!”
Here are some other Yasuri Yamileth wannabe’s in Caracas! Some are more artistic, like this medley compiled by Mardecio films, and others like this one, in spanish, are more scientific…
¡EnjoYea estos vídeos!

About systems of representation in design

Design, General

Spidey

Welcome 2007!

“…the elementary unit of information—is a difference which makes a difference.” Gregory Bateson, anthropologist

During the last decades of the 20th century the switch from analog to digital media effected a major transformation on the fabric of human society. Throughout this time of upheaval we also witnessed the birth of the digital media with its convergence of art, science, and technology resulting in novel modes of human expression in communication, education, social interaction, and design.

The profound influence of such changes will continue to be the subject and fuel of much research and development work. An axiomatic principle of the difference between the new media and its previous analog counterpart rests on the essence of digital data as being placeholder of interpretation and representation. Consider a basic example used in the Wikipedia to illustrate this corollary by showing us how the arbitrary sequence of a digital code like “0100 0001” might be interpreted (and represented) as the decimal number 65, the hexadecimal number 41 or the glyph “A”.

This relation has a direct bearing on the position of design in language: Because design happens in language, an important task for the designer is that of ontology creation. When we initially imagine an artifact of design in the digital dimension, in essence we are constructing the ontology that describes the artifact as well gathering and bringing forth the ecosystem in which it aspires to unfold. This is why, as designers, we also have an ethical responsibility.

Design activity has a multi-dimensional scope and outreach. Because of their role as part of human activity, all artifacts—including those involving stochastic processes—are intentionally created. Also as cultural objects artifacts become and exist in space and time. But artifacts are also autopoietic entities. This means that their state-of-being is commensurate with changes in the world that they populate and influence.

Design activity is about translation. This is because design is about sense making and meaning always exists within a system other than that of the designer. When we as designers, question ourselves about the meaning of an artifact, we are indeed translating from one system to another. That is, from our understanding into an understanding of the understanding of others.

In design, a systemic approach to all these variables should begin by recognizing and seeking to understand difference. Difference with respect to relation… What good would be the map without the territory? For Information exists only in relation to other things.

(Link to the full text presentation: About Systems of Representation in Design which I presented at the Innaugural Seminar on January 9, 2007.)
Also here is a YouTube link to the Spiderman Twin Tower Teaser I refer to in the presentation.

A slightly updated version of the essay, About Systems in Representation in Design.

Design Research Seminar at Media Lab

Anthropology, Design, General

We have had some neat speakers in the past two week. On Tuesday November 14, we featured Senior Researcher, Taina Raijanti. Dr. Raijanti spoke on the topic of What is ethnography? Below are my notes from her lecture…

taina_small.jpg

What is ethnography?
By Taina Rajanti

Anthropology is concerned with how culture happens in everyday life. Why do we need ethnographic data?

In social science, ethnographic data is the simples form of data: something you get by simple observation. Whether it is looking at it yourself or simply asking people, or taking pictures, etc. But the whole point is What are you going to do with it? Ex: What do people think about the Nokia 6300? What does the Nokia 63 series makes them feel like?

Ethnography is so simple that it does not make sense to say that you should do it in a particular way. Still, you need to have some very basic information so that you can weight your claims…

First of all, you need a theoretical framework… The you need to get your data… And then you need to reflect on how you are going to use it…

Why is the theoretical framework there in the beginning? It frames what you ask and what you get from the data. It supplies a scheme, a structure. You will not see anything in the data unless you have something else in your “head” before.

The objectiveness of doing research comes from the rules that you use or follow when you are doing the research. This is why you have to have concepts.

A concept is not a thing or a word: It is about trying to look at something in a context. (And Not by Itself.) A Concept puts thing in a Context and as a Whole: It has a Logic, a Dynamic, and a Structure. A Concept puts Things into a Context.

What happens when we look at concepts rather than the phenomenon itself. Here is an example: Socialization. This is a concept that seeks to explain that you learn to behave according to your social position. So you look at what is happening and you record.

Bruno Latour in Science in the Making speaks about Actant: An actor who does not get to speak for himself or herself. How does this get reified?

[Lily] “Is this similar to the concept of Subaltern in Post-Colonial theory?”
[Taina] There are similarities.

Concept is a scientific way of looking at things. You need the concept and the conceptual frame to be able to see the phenomenon. It is needed for when you are going to manipulate the data.

What is it that you look for? It is the everyday concepts… the meanings. Things exist for people if they are meaningful.

You need to find out what is meaningful for people and why? Meanings are everyday concepts.
In doing research, the first thing to do is ask is Why do I want to do this? What do I want to find out? Ask the same question after you have brought your data. Doing research is about finding your own basic difference. And about finding out about what is relevant or irrelevant.

On ethnographic research: Why should designers be concerned with ethnographic research? Because you can find out what people are thinking and then you can also get them involved in the process of design.

Ethnographic research is needed when you need to find out about people’s meanings. These cannot be constructed from statistics, for example. The context is important.

Information Visualization & Design

Design, Visualization

This week I spent teaching a workshop at Media Lab Helsinki, on the topic of Information Visualization and Design (IVD). Among the topics covered were a basic introduction to the theory of graphics by Jacques Bertin. Two exercises were succesfully accomplished by the group comprising 14 hard working MA students. These were:

  1. Personal Timeline Chart. (See selected works here:infodescomp.pdf)
  2. Affective Map (For more information, press here: mapping.pdf.)
    What is the oil and water in your life?