Sharing The Wealth: Crowd Sourcing Texts And Artifacts

Summary

Historical archaeological studies have always relied upon statistically valid datasets for quantitative analyses and often required that archaeologists wade through volumes of text for clues to a site’s historical context.  The digital age allows for the collection of these data in a variety of ways including gathering primary sources through crowd sourcing – multiple users, often from a diversity of sites or backgrounds, compiling data into a central repository.  This paper explores the utility of crowd sourcing in historical archaeology through an examination of two projects, transcription of ledgers and store accounts by university classes and a state-society’s attempt to crowd source data about three artifact classes (projectile points, wine bottle seals and tobacco pipe maker’s marks) using web based catalogues.  Methodological and theoretical challenges to crowd sourcing data, compiling, proofing and editing crowd sourced items and the utility of using these raw materials are addressed. 

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Digital Archaeology Data: Issues and Possibilities   •
• Society for Historical Archaeology 2016

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Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Society for Historical Archaeology

Record Identifiers

PaperId(s): 723