Travelogue group members
Sarah  – Project Manager
Amy  – Technology and Design
Melanie  – Outreach and Communication
Evonne  – Research
Adam  – Technology and Design

The Travelogue project will disrupt and broaden the expatriate narrative, while at the same time compiling American literary travel narratives and timelines with web mapping.  Mapping these journeys for display on an interactive website will provide both a visual and theoretical representation of modern literary movements in America, enabling the humanities community to gain a broader understanding of the history and underlying structure of these works.  It will also act as a pedagogical tool, allowing students to see narratives and literary movements represented through interactive, visual means, and as a general source of information for a wider public audience.

Thursday, February 20th

The team has been off to a successful start, communicating consistently through the Travelogue CUNY Commons group page that Amy created.  As a group, we have been discussing what the scope of the project is and what we would like it to look like.

Sarah created a Google folder for the project.  The folder features the project plan Excel spreadsheet and sheets for info on each of the four authors Travelogue will feature.  Sarah has been providing an outline for the project scope, noting details of the author’s “life journey” that Travelogue should be highlighting.

We have been exploring a diverse list of American authors that have traveled substantially and or lived abroad.  This week we plan on solidifying the list of four authors.  Zora Neale Hurston http://chdr.cah.ucf.edu/hurstonarchive/ and Ernest Hemingway http://www.jfklibrary.org/Research/The-Ernest-Hemingway-Collection.aspx will most likely be featured.  Evonne has been researching the authors, narrowing down the list to authors that fit the Travelogue criteria, and have the greatest volume of digital content available.  She has created a Google doc with the data collected.

Amy and I have been researching tutorials and guides for the possible platforms.  We have been sharing the info and links on the group’s Commons page.  Amy and I have also researched possible authors to feature, focusing on female authors.  I created a Twitter account for Travelogue and shared the account info with the group.  During the next collaborative class session, I will inquire as to what the best practices are for sharing project progression details publicly through social media.

Possible platforms the group has discussed:

– CartoDB
– Mapbox
– Google Maps + Google Fusion Tables
– Omeka + Neatline

Adam sketched a logo for Travelogue.  We all agreed it was great.  He has scanned it and has been actively sharing drafts of the logo with the group as he works on the design.  Adam has also been researching Neatline+Omeka, along with other platforms and tutorials.  The group is looking forward to consulting with Steven Romalewski on which platform would be best and most feasible within the scope of the project.  The front runner, platform-wise, has been Omeka+Neatline.  Sarah has also been researching CartoDB, its functionalities and  the cost involved in the usage of CartoDB.

If you want to contact us please do. Our project blog is at  travelogue.commons.gc.cuny.edu. Email us at dhtravelogue [at] gmail [dot] com or follow us on Twitter @DhTravelogue