Slide 1
Slide 1 text
CUNY Digital Humanities Initiative
Lighting Talks 2025
Building a Digital Humanities Community
at the City University of New York
Tuesday, October 28th 2025, 6:30pm
Skylight Room & Zoom
Slide 2
Slide 2 text
Digital Pedagogy
Slide 3
Slide 3 text
Open infrastructure for open education:
OpenLab at City Tech & CBOX OpenLab
CUNY DHI Lightning Talks 2025 | Tuesday October 28, 2025
Charlie Edwards, City Tech
Slide 4
Slide 4 text
The
OpenLab
at City
Tech
openlab.citytech.cuny.edu
An (award-winning!)
open platform that
everyone at the
college can use
Open education,
collaboration,
community
Slide 5
Slide 5 text
Commons
in a Box
OpenLab
An open platform for
open learning
Built through
collaboration
Customizable to meet
institutional needs
Supports open
pedagogies, OER, and
more
Slide 6
Slide 6 text
A growing community of OpenLabs
At CUNY, SUNY, and beyond. Visit cboxopenlab.org to join us!
Slide 7
Slide 7 text
Transcarta
Dr. Sarah Archino, Furman University
Dr. Karen Shelby, Baruch College
Dr. Doug Singsen, University of Wisconsin-Parkside
Slide 8
Slide 8 text
Transcarta is an interactive app consisting of a map, timeline, and image viewer for use by
teachers, students, researchers, and members of the public.
Transcarta will have the ability to customize selections of artworks by geographic region, time
period, subject matter, and other criteria, to display customized lists of artworks on an
interactive map.
The map and timeline would help users understand and visualize the interconnections
between different artworks and cultures over time. The map and timeline could be used by
instructors to anchor a fully OER curriculum or to supplement a textbook or other readings.
Slide 9
Slide 9 text
Transcarta will be developed and operated by Art History Teaching Resources (AHTR), a
web-based platform that connects a diverse field of educators in art history, visual culture,
and related fields.
Transcarta will be used to easily
visualize the geographic and
chronological relationships between
subject and site.
Slide 10
Slide 10 text
Digital Projects
Slide 11
Slide 11 text
Collecting Data
about GBV in
North Africa
Melissa Ditmore
melissaditmore.com
Nawara.org
Slide 12
Slide 12 text
Piloting in Morocco
● Survey form
● What, where, when, who
● Did you report to the police, and
why not
● Personal follow up: Do you want
to be contacted by Nawara - if
yes, how
Slide 13
Slide 13 text
Thank you!
Designing and Evaluating a Prototype of a Trilingual Data Collection Tool for the Middle East
and North Africa (MENA) Region to Collect Data About Violence Against Sex Workers:
Multiple Methods Approach in User-Centered Design:
https://formative.jmir.org/2025/1/e65210
User-Centered Design for Designing and Evaluating a Prototype of a Data Collection Tool to
Submit Information About Incidents of Violence Against Sex Workers: Multiple Methods
Approach: https://humanfactors.jmir.org/2024/1/e53557
Or search “Ditmore” on JMIR.org
Slide 14
Slide 14 text
Guyanese in the USA
A review of Guyanese data in the American Community Survey Public Use
Microdata Sample and New York City Neighborhood T
abulation Areas (ACS,
PUMS, and NYC NTA data, 2023)
by Rohan Ramnarain
M.S. Candidate, Data Analysis and Visualization
Slide 15
Slide 15 text
Guyanese in the USA reside mostly in Queens and Brooklyn.
Slide 16
Slide 16 text
Guyanese in the USA obtain degrees differently based on
foreign-born vs. native status.
Slide 17
Slide 17 text
Guyanese in the USA are almost twice as likely to have
private health insurance vs. public coverage.
Slide 18
Slide 18 text
Machine-reading Gentrification
on Bed-Stuy's Storefront Signs
Alex McQuilkin
MS, Data Analysis & Visualization
Capstone Fall 2025 Matt Gold
Slide 19
Slide 19 text
Old-school vs. new-school signage
Taxonomy borrowed from John Jay sociolinguist Shonna Trinch/cultural
anthropologist Edward Snajdr's "What the Signs Say: Language, Gentrification,
and Place-Making in Brooklyn" (2020)
Slide 20
Slide 20 text
Retail turnover in Bed-Stuy
● More likely to open (2018-24): bars, coffee shops, real estate agencies, art galleries
● More likely to close (2018-24): hair salons, barber shops, daycare centers, churches
Slide 21
Slide 21 text
Google's Teachable Machine
● Images for ~1,900 closed storefronts and ~1,200 newly opened (2018-2025; LiveXYZ.com)
Slide 22
Slide 22 text
Digital Archives
Slide 23
Slide 23 text
Tunes Near and
Far: Collections of
the Chinese
Musical and
Theatrical
Association: A
Digital Exhibit on
Omeka
Cen Liu, PhD Candidate in Theatre
and Performance
The Graduate Center, CUNY
Slide 24
Slide 24 text
No content
Slide 25
Slide 25 text
No content
Slide 26
Slide 26 text
Digital Exhibits
Slide 27
Slide 27 text
•How can we learn from Black diasporic and
Latinx practices that exist outside of academia and
traditional K-12 education in ways that can help us
reimagine practices that lead to liberatory futures ?
•I use visual tools within my research to serve as a
counter-narrative to rethink pedagogical practices
aims to uplift non-traditional educational spaces
and honor non-academic ways of knowing.
Ph.D. in Urban Education
CUNY Graduate Center
Slide 28
Slide 28 text
https://thebushwickarchive.org/
Slide 29
Slide 29 text
Digital tool called
OMEKA
Anti-gentrification
community-led
archive
Slide 30
Slide 30 text
No content
Slide 31
Slide 31 text
No content
Slide 32
Slide 32 text
No content
Slide 33
Slide 33 text
No content
Slide 34
Slide 34 text
Finding Lesbian Housing Practices in the
Lesbian Switchboard Call Logs
Maggie Schreiner,
CUNY Graduate Center
DHI Lightning Talks, October 28, 2025
Slide 35
Slide 35 text
Digitization and OCR Process
Sunday April 17. Roslyn + Nicole
8:30 ♀ called wanting referrals to discussion
groups and comfortable places to meet
people. Referred to us by MCC. Refered her to
LFL, I House, West Side Discussion Group.
8:45 ♀ called for apartment to share or
sublet - gave her the ads we have on our
board - also she wanted sub-lets.
8:55 ♀ called for info about Boston, and
Events - ♀♀ organizations, etc. told her
about Boston, D.O.B.
10:20 ♀ called. Feeling very lonely, Afraid to
take steps to meet and be with other women.
Wanted assurances about taking risks and
trying to form relationships.
Roslyn signing off. See you tomorrow.
Slide 36
Slide 36 text
Call Frequencies
by Category
(using Voyant)
Housing words:
● apt*
● apartment*
● evict*
● home*
● landlord*
● rent*
● room*
● shelter*
Housing Health Entertainment
Slide 37
Slide 37 text
Close Reading
using Taguette 7:35 ♀ wanting to share apt in Queens (September ?, 1972).
7:39 ♀ called having problem with other tenants in her apartment, name calling,
harassment, wants to know where to get help before her kids start getting hassled,
referred to lesbian mothers groups for support (May 13, 1980).
700 ♀ called in need of lawyer & psychotherapist. Was kicked out her apt because
landlord discovered she was lesbian. LANDLORD HOLDING ALL HER POSSESSIONS.
Discuss Her options (April 6, 1978).
Themes:
● Roommates
● Harassment
● Eviction
Slide 38
Slide 38 text
No content
Slide 39
Slide 39 text
No content
Slide 40
Slide 40 text
No content
Slide 41
Slide 41 text
Archiving Precarious
Knowledge
and Knowledge Work
Nelson Igunma
DHI Lightning Talks
Fall 2025
Slide 42
Slide 42 text
Why?
● David Zeitlyn (2012) on
archives as instruments of
hegemony or subversion
● Michel Callan (1998) on
“the material reality of
calculation”
● Micki McGee (2005) on the
belabored self
● Maribel Casas-Cortes
(2021) on precarious
writings
How?
Slide 43
Slide 43 text
THANK YOU FOR LISTENING!
about.me/nelsoni
Slide 44
Slide 44 text
Artificial Intelligence
Slide 45
Slide 45 text
No content
Slide 46
Slide 46 text
No content
Slide 47
Slide 47 text
No content
Slide 48
Slide 48 text
No content
Slide 49
Slide 49 text
No content
Slide 50
Slide 50 text
No content
Slide 51
Slide 51 text
Seeing the Difference:
A Human vs. A.I.
Writing Visualization
Tool
By Nicole Walker
Slide 52
Slide 52 text
No content
Slide 53
Slide 53 text
No content
Slide 54
Slide 54 text
54
A Digital Humanities Tool for
Confronting Difficult Histories
UI/UX Developer: David Schwittek (CUNY)
Lead author: Temi Odumosu (UW)
Annotating
The New
Union Club
Slide 55
Slide 55 text
● OpenSeaDragon and custom JS
● Ethical UI patterns
● Grayscale/Color filtering
David Schwittek
10/28/2025
55
Slide 56
Slide 56 text
AI-Supported Design as Interpretive Practice
Crtical UI/UX
David Schwittek
10/28/2025
Using code creatively
Reducing the barriers to coding.
Achievable end goals.
UI/UX can serve as a critical lens for
public engagement with difficult materials.
Cognitive Offloading
AI tools don’t replace thought—they help us build better,
more ethical tools, faster.
Slide 57
Slide 57 text
USING CHATGPT TO CODE
GOOGLE SHEETS APPS SCRIPT
Slide 58
Slide 58 text
CLEANED CSV: ATHENA AT THE MET
Slide 59
Slide 59 text
SHEET IMPORTED TO AIRTABLE
Slide 60
Slide 60 text
Institutional Projects
Slide 61
Slide 61 text
No content
Slide 62
Slide 62 text
No content
Slide 63
Slide 63 text
No content
Slide 64
Slide 64 text
No content
Slide 65
Slide 65 text
No content
Slide 66
Slide 66 text
No content
Slide 67
Slide 67 text
No content
Slide 68
Slide 68 text
No content
Slide 69
Slide 69 text
No content
Slide 70
Slide 70 text
No content
Slide 71
Slide 71 text
Digital Publishing
Slide 72
Slide 72 text
Manifold
Slide 73
Slide 73 text
Teaching
Slide 74
Slide 74 text
Journals
Slide 75
Slide 75 text
Scholarship
Slide 76
Slide 76 text
Creative Work
Slide 77
Slide 77 text
Omnibus Ciambelli
Stefano Morello
American Social History Project/Center for Media and Learning
CUNY Graduate Center
Slide 78
Slide 78 text
Omnibus Ciambelli
● Bernardino Ciambelli:
○ Journalist
○ Serial novelist
○ Playwright
○ Public figure
● Problem: inconsistent archive
● Solution: curated, open access edition
Slide 79
Slide 79 text
Omnibus Ciambelli (Novels)
● I misteri di Mulberry Street (1893)
● I drammi dell’emigrazione (1894)
● I misteri della polizia (Il delitto di Water Street) (1895)
● I misteri di Bleecker Street (1899)
● Il delitto di Coney Island (La Follia, 1907)*
● La strage degli innocenti (La Follia, 1909)*
● I misteri di Harlem (Ovvero, la bella di Elizabeth Street) (La
Follia, 1910)*
● Il terremoto di Sicilia e Calabria (1909)
● L’aeroplano fantasma (La Follia, 1911)*
● I sotterranei di New York (1915)
● Amore, lussuria e morte (L’Indipendente, 1916)*
● La prostituta di Vienna (1917)
● La trovatella di Mulberry Street (1919)
Slide 80
Slide 80 text
Omnibus Ciambelli (Manifold)
Slide 81
Slide 81 text
Digital Memories Vol. V
A Collaborative Manifold Publication
Edited by Lini Radhakrishnan and Cathleen Melamed
Spring 2025
Slide 82
Slide 82 text
Project Phases
Project Initiation
“Collaboration” theme and
review template introduced
and discussed with the class
Editing Process
Developed and shared the
submission, editing, and
progress tracking processes
Theme Embodied
Collaborative processes:
class feedback, inspiration
from the Manifold community
Manifold Onboarding
Cycles of ingestion testing,
review categorization, and
design choices
Slide 83
Slide 83 text
Embodying Collaboration
Throughout Production
REVIEW PROCESS EDITING PROCESS CATEGORIZATION DESIGN ELEMENTS
● Participatory logo designs
● Visual relief - Linked images
● Broad Categorization
● Reviewer identified
keywords in Manifold
tags and TOC
● Site preview & class
feedback before publication
● Collaboration questions
for each review
● Requested feedback on
editorial review
● Documented innovations
in Manifold Resource
Collections
● Professor’s contribution to
introduction
Winning
design on Vol
Cover
Other submissions
featured in TOC
thumbnail, collection
coverl
Slide 84
Slide 84 text
Manifold Design and Processes
Cohesion Manifold helped us provide a visually unified, curated collection of digital reviews
Flexibility
Manifold allowed us to integrate visual elements and links within the texts and in
the resource collection, both of which are useful for archiving
Flexible workarounds made possible by the platform
Slide 85
Slide 85 text
Many thanks to Professor Borrachero, Professor Miller,
and the Digital Memories Spring 2025 class
for their invaluable contributions and guidance.
Visit our project here:
Digital Memories Volume V
Thank You!
Slide 86
Slide 86 text
Why Make A Website
For Your Tenants’ Association?
• Corruption spreads in secrecy
• Public information can counter real estate speculation
• Embolden neighbors to take action against their landlords
• All you need is a domain, a hosting service, and a Wordpress install (if that)
Slide 87
Slide 87 text
No content
Slide 88
Slide 88 text
“Stewardship, not ownership, is
the path to adulthood”
– Amy Starecheski, Ours to Lose: When Squatters
Became Homeowners in New York City
• Landlords are well organized and share
information with each other
• They depend on tenants who:
• Don’t speak to each other
• Don’t know their rights
• Are afraid of standing up to corruption
• Redress the power imbalance through
publishing and creating networks!
Slide 89
Slide 89 text
Impromptu Presentations
Slide 90
Slide 90 text
Questions?
Slide 91
Slide 91 text
THANK YOU!!!