Distant Reader Study Carrels, Curated

This is a list of curated Distant Reader study carrels.

Distant Reader study carrels are data sets intended to be read by people as well as computers. The study carrels presented here have had some analysis -- commentary -- done against them. Such is the point of the Reader: 1) create a data set, 2) analyze ("read") it, 3) write up the analysis, and 4) share the result with the wider world. See also, the list of all study carrels.

The list is presented in reverse-chronological order:

• AI Survey Analysis - This missive outlines what I learned by analyzing the qualitative responses found in a survey on the topic of artificial intelligence. While the volume of content was relatively small, I assert there are some concerns regarding the use of artificial intelligence, and the concerns surround the use of AI by students and their ability to do research.
  • tools; artificial intelligence; Distant Reader; distant reading; study carrel; survey analysis
  • 2024-01-13
• What are hermits? - For a good time, I collected and analyzed ("read") as many books and articles on the topic of hermits as I could, and I did this for the purposes of simply learning about hermits and hermitages. What did I learn? Simply put, my understanding of what hermits was re-enforced. Hermits are solitary people -- usually men -- and they are usually interested in delving into religious experiences. Along the way I also learned a bit about hermit crabs.
  • day; Distant Reader; distant reading; hands; hermit crabs; hermits; life; man; love; mind; study carrel; time
  • 2023-12-23
• A Year of Journal of Open Humanities Data - I asked myself, "What can I learn by applying distant reading computing techniques against a single year of content from the Journal of Open Humanities Data?" In a sentence, I learned a great deal about the Journal, and it very much lives up to is name.
  • Journal of Open Humanities Data; Distant Reader; distant reading; study carrel; dataset; information; research; analysis; corpora
  • 2023-07-13
• Analyzing the University of Notre Dame's Theses & Dissertations - For a number of reasons, I spent some time analyzing a subset of the University of Notre Dame's theses & dissertations, and this missive outlines what I learned.
  • cells; data; Distant Reader; distant reading; energy; flow; religion; politics; society; study carrel; surface; systems; theses and dissertations; University of Notre Dame
  • 2023-06-28
• DEI in libraries - Relatively recently, a colleague (Peggy Griesinger) distributed a bibliography on the topic of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI), and I decided to spend some time analyzing the content of the bibliography. This missive outlines what I was able to extract, given the limited time I spent.
  • diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI); Distant Reader; study carrel; distant reading; american; people; libraries; resources; knowledge; access; community
  • 2023-05-12
• Theological Librarianship (Volume 16, Number 1): More questions than answers - In an effort to see how quickly I can do analysis, against the entire issue of a given journal, I did some reading against Theological Librarianship (Volume 16, Number 1), and in the end, I am going away with more questions than answers, but I did learn about "ethiopic".
  • collections; distant reading; Distant Reader; information; libraries; study carrel; Theological Librarianship; theology
  • 2023-04-27
• Emily Dickinson's Poems: Series #1, #2, and #3 - I did the quickest of readings against Emily Dickinson's three series of poems, and, quite frankly, I did not learn a whole lot.
  • day; Distant Reader; distant reading; Emily Dickinson; flower; god; heaven; live; love; study carrel; summer; time
  • 2023-04-23
• What is war, and how can it be justified? - I set out to address the questions, "What is war, and how can it be justified?" I propose to accomplish my goal by doing some analysis against the suggested readings of the University's 2022 Forum on War and Peace. More specifically, I digitized the suggested readings, amalgamated the readings into a corpus, applied a number of different data science computing technquies against the corpus, and tried to answer my questions. Below is what I learned.
  • Distant Reader; distant reading; face; god; heart; help; home; justice; men; military; study carrel; time; war
  • 2023-04-05
• How to Read a Whole HathiTrust Collection - This Web pages outlines a process to use and understand ("read") the whole of a HathiTrust collection. Such a process is outlined here: 1) articulate a research question, 2)search the 'Trust and create a collection, 3) download the collection file and refine it, or at the least, remove duplicates, 4) use the result as input to htid2books; download the full text of each item, 5) use Reader Toolbox to build a "study carrel"; create a data set, 6) compute against the data set to address the research question, and 7) go to Step #1; repeat iteratively
  • beauty; data science; Distant Reader; distant reading; fear; HathiTrust; life; man; mind; nature; power; study carrel
  • 2023-03-29
• Discernment, or "It's a lot about Mom." - Joey Jegier and I would like to know, "When it comes to a set of first year student writings (reflections), with what other words does the word 'discernment' keep?" The answer to this question helps address other, broader questions about the ways students' hearts and minds mature over the first year of their college experience.
  • career; community; discernment; Distant Reader; distant reading; life; love; people; study carrel; time; world
  • 2023-03-23
• Hesburgh Libraries Archives - I am curious to learn, "What sorts of things are in the Hesburgh Libraries Archives?"
  • club; college; Distant Reader; distant reading; hall; Hesburgh Libraries Archives; Notre Dame; students; study carrel
  • 2023-03-07
• Race and Ethnic Relations - I applied bits of text mining, natural langauge processing, and data science to a pair of annual editions of Race and Ethnic Relations, and below is a summary of what I learned.
  • american; asians; blacks; chinese; Distant Reader; distant reading; people; politics; Race and Ethnic Relations; race; study carrel; women; world
  • 2023-02-07
• Public schools in New Orleans by topic - I did some rudimentary investigations of public schools in New Orleans after extracting sets of documents on given topics, namely: black, charter, new, schools, and teachers. Below is an introduction to what I found.
  • New Orleans; public schools; charter schools; Hurricane Katrina
  • 2023-02-02
• Code4Lib Journal, Issue 55 - The lastest issue of Code4Lib Journal came out yesterday, and I wanted to see how quickly I could garner insights regarding the issue's themes, topics, and questions addressed. I was able to satisfy my curiosity about these self-imposed challenges, but ironically, it took me longer to write this blog posting than it did for me to do the analysis.
  • Code4Lib Journal; Distant Reader; distant reading; study carrel; library; file; data; open source; video; Google
  • 2023-01-21
• Reading Journal of eScience Librarianship: Responsible AI in Libraries and Archives - A special issue of Journal of eScience Librarianship was brought to my attention. The issue was on the topic of responsible AI in libraries and archives. I did a bit of distant reading against the issue, and outlined here are some of my take-aways. In short, AI is something to consider in Library Land, but not without some forethought.
  • artificial intelligence; data; Distant Reader; distant reading; escience; Journal of eScience Librarianship; librarianship; libraries; study carrel
  • 2022-10-28
• Where in the world is TCB? - A colleague (Christa Strickler) announced on a mailing list (ACQNET) the existence of a new issue of TCB (Technical Services in Religion and Theology). It was touted as an open access journal, and I wondered whether or not there was an application programmer interface (API) for downloading the content. After a bit of rooting around, I discovered that TCB is published using a system called Open Journal Systems (OJS), and OJS rigorously supports a protocol called OAI-PMH. So, to answer my question, "Yes, TCB does support an API.". This data set outlines some of the things I learned through the application of distant reading against it.
  • cataloging; classification; Distant Reader; distant reading; information; library; RDA; religion; study carrel; services; Technical Services in Religion and Theology; theology
  • 2022-10-28
• Reading HaunthiTrust, or Spooky Season fun in the HTDL - Just for fun, let's read a HathiTrust collection called HaunthiTrust.
  • day; Distant Reader; distant reading; doors; eyes; HathiTrust; head; place; study carrel; thought; time; spooky; ghosts; haunted
  • 2022-10-22
• Reading Information Technology and Libraries (volume 41, number 2, June 2022) - Today, for a good time, I applied my Reader Toolbox to the latest issue of ITAL for the two-fold purposes of: 1) just seing whether the Toolbox could function, and 2) determine the degree I could extract meaningful themes from the issue. Well, the Toolbox functioned, in that it did not crash nor output invalid data, and I do believe I could pull out themes, in that each issue's authors wrote about something distinctive, and I could identify those things. Below describes my process.
  • Information Technology and Libraries (ITAL); distant reading; Distant Reader; study carrel; libraries; technology; information; research
  • 2022-06-22
• University of Notre Dame News: A Reading - I have done a bit of analysis -- reading -- against the set of news distributed by the University of Notre Dame, and below is some of what I learned.
  • awards; Distant Reader; distant reading; lectures; people; research; football; students; professors; study carrel; University of Notre Dame news
  • 2022-02-22

Eric Lease Morgan <[email protected]>
Navari Family Center for Digital Schoarship
University of Notre Dame

October 25, 2024