Digital Editing Workshops for Building Campus Public History Communities and Developing Student Leaders

abstract:This paper presents an approach to designing editing workshops related to digital public history projects based on archival materials at institutions of higher learning. These events engage campus communities in the practice of public history and create opportunities for students interested in archives and digital humanities to develop professional skills. The model draws on the experiences of faculty, staff, and students who have contributed to Editing the Eartha M. M. White Collection, a pedagogically focused project that explores methods for the collaborative online publication of selected personal papers and correspondence of local African American leader Eartha M. M. White (1876–1974), held in the Special Collections of the Thomas G. Carpenter Library at the University of North Florida. Although this article focuses on designing workshops in the context of higher education, the model discussed can potentially be extended to other contexts beyond the campus.