So, after a few weeks of tedious data entry I’ve finally gotten to the point of actually making maps in ArcGIS online, and it has certainly been an eye opening experience. The sheer amount of options available in the software is extremely overwhelming. And then, coupled with the amount of information that I need to make sure is included in each data point is staggering. One thing that I noticed for the data table that I finished, is that some of the points like longitude and latitude have a hard time showing up in the table if I don’t have them formatted in a certain way.
If one is looking at the rough draft it may seem like most of the work is already done, however, I feel that I could still do weeks worth of work on it. I want to figure out how to remove the roman roads that aren’t specifically in North Africa and fix the display of the data points. However, I may also have to go back into the spreadsheet I created of all the roman cities and towns, in order to reorganize the data better, and figure out how it needs to be formatted in order to make all the data properly show up when the point is selected. I also need to better figure out how to use the Vector Tile Style Editor, which is used to create them. I understand the basic concept of its use, but the nuts and bolts of using it are still a bit confusing.
One of the more enlightening things about this last week, was the assigned reading “The Case For Bringing Experimental Learning into the Humanities.”. It starts out by highlighting the decline in conferred PhDs in the last few years which I have personally felt the sting of. I very much would have been interested in going for further education into a PhD track, but the amount of people accepted into University PhD programs is shrinking. I heard that Princeton is allowing as few as three into the History PhD track. The article gives the statistic of less than 1,000 PhDs given out in 2019, and this was then further shot down with the outbreak of Covid-19.
This is followed up by the writers pointing out the growing skepticism of the relevance of humanistic studies for nonacademic career preparation. This is a frustrating thing to read as someone who for their entire schooling lifer had been in the Humanities, whether that be English or History. I remember distinctly being annoyed how I was made to take classes in science and math, however, I fully acknowledge the necessity of these in a well-rounded education. Humanities provides a similar function, it teaches you not only history, but debate, writing, discussion, collaboration, critical thinking, I can’t really imagine how it would be without some of the things that I learned.
However, a majority of the reading is focused mainly the expansion of the job market and the new focus on “career diversity” that is going on in the field. I experienced things like this in every day life, when I tell people I major in history right away they say “Oh so you’re going to be a teacher?” and while it’s an innocent enough question, I simply don’t see myself being fulfilled as a teacher in the future for the next say twenty years. The idea a Humanities students going into simply teacher or researching, the article points out the skills many Universities are trying to highlight which include collaboration, communication, basic quantitative literacy, digital literacy, and intellectual self-confidence, which can all lead to more diverse careers.
The highlight of more diverse skills that come with a Humanities degree is something that I’ve seen come to fruition as my internship this semester has progressed. From spending a week crafting spreadsheets of data, to my first time truly collaborating with a group, to the process of troubleshooting when using ArcGIS and figuring out how to get the desired look and effects on my maps. I’d even go as far as to say that I have a bit of an eye for design now after crafting the maps like I have. As the semester goes on, and I finish up my maps and projects, I fully expect this skill set and career options to expand even further.
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