A Special Visit

On March 3^rd Prof. Boulou from the University of Ottawa, head of the Promised Land Project, came to Huron in order to speak with a group of secondary school students from Chatham, Ontario.  Following this he was able to visit our class for a short time in order to discuss our class projects and the use of technology in history with us.  During his conversation with the Oberlin Project group we told him about our individual portions of the project which led to a discussion about the digital humanities.  The importance of interdisciplinary projects, intersections of different ways of thinking and producing work, and new ways of thinking through disciplines and their connections were focused upon.  He described the Promised Land project as a converging object, within which multiple disciplines can find their voice—our class project is a microcosm of this.  By allowing each person to explore their strengths multiple perspectives and truths can be explored within the context of the project that no one person may be able to delve into on their own.  In both cases multiple people/disciplines are able to find a voice within the larger project and historical materials are able to be explored without necessarily utilizing traditional historical methods to do so.  Opening up the project to a large number of researchers, from various disciplinary backgrounds and allowing it to appeal to a broader audience.  This discussion helped to reaffirm the importance of the project to the group and demonstrated to us the practical abilities we are taking away from a largely theoretical course.