Title: DeXTER: A post-authentic approach to heritage visualisation
Author, co-author: Viola, Lorella
Abstract: Cultural heritage institutions and academics are resorting more and more to visual representations of cultural heritage material as a way to enhance access to collections for users’ appreciation and research purposes (Windhager et al., 2019). However, scholars have pointed out (Drucker, 2011; 2013; 2014; 2020; Windhager et al., 2019) how a critical approach to visualisation is still largely missing and how on the whole, user-interface (UI) design still shows a functional and task-driven approach, oriented towards satisfying a need for information rather than towards eliciting curiosity, engagement and reflection. With this presentation, I aim to contribute to the urgent need for the establishment of a critical data and visualisation literacy in current task-driven approaches to interface design which continue to see the user as a consumer and to operate within a problem solver model. Drawing on critical posthumanities (Braidotti, 2017; 2019), I here propose a critical framework to digital cultural heritage and digital cultural heritage visualisation. With this approach —which I labelled “postauthentic framework” (Viola, 2021) —I want to initiate a discussion and critique of the fetishization of empriricism and technical objectivity in digital knowledge creation. To exemplify how the post-authentic framework works in practice, I present the design choices for developing the tool DeXTER – DeepteXTminER, an interactive visualisation app to explore enriched cultural heritage material. The discussion will revolve around the challenges facing product design, with specific reference to visualising the ambiguities and uncertainties of network analysis (NA) and sentiment analysis (SA). DeXTER is currently loaded with Chroniclitaly 3.0 (Viola and Fiscarelli, 2021a), a digital heritage collection of Italian American newspapers published in the USA by Italian immigrants between 1897 and 1936.
Author, co-author: Viola, Lorella
Abstract: Cultural heritage institutions and academics are resorting more and more to visual representations of cultural heritage material as a way to enhance access to collections for users’ appreciation and research purposes (Windhager et al., 2019). However, scholars have pointed out (Drucker, 2011; 2013; 2014; 2020; Windhager et al., 2019) how a critical approach to visualisation is still largely missing and how on the whole, user-interface (UI) design still shows a functional and task-driven approach, oriented towards satisfying a need for information rather than towards eliciting curiosity, engagement and reflection. With this presentation, I aim to contribute to the urgent need for the establishment of a critical data and visualisation literacy in current task-driven approaches to interface design which continue to see the user as a consumer and to operate within a problem solver model. Drawing on critical posthumanities (Braidotti, 2017; 2019), I here propose a critical framework to digital cultural heritage and digital cultural heritage visualisation. With this approach —which I labelled “postauthentic framework” (Viola, 2021) —I want to initiate a discussion and critique of the fetishization of empriricism and technical objectivity in digital knowledge creation. To exemplify how the post-authentic framework works in practice, I present the design choices for developing the tool DeXTER – DeepteXTminER, an interactive visualisation app to explore enriched cultural heritage material. The discussion will revolve around the challenges facing product design, with specific reference to visualising the ambiguities and uncertainties of network analysis (NA) and sentiment analysis (SA). DeXTER is currently loaded with Chroniclitaly 3.0 (Viola and Fiscarelli, 2021a), a digital heritage collection of Italian American newspapers published in the USA by Italian immigrants between 1897 and 1936.