I think this point speaks to the varying conspicuity of disability, especially relating to the invisibility of being physically disabled. While having a cognitive disability is not conspicuous, a physical disability is conspicuous, as is the infrastructure meant to make the built environment accessible. Ironically, a lack of conspicuous accessible infrastructure then begets the invisibility of conspicuously-disabled people. Since I started attending Vassar, I can recall meeting only two students with physical disabilities (one using a wheelchair and the other semi-ambulatory). This student population is not proportional to that of off-campus physical disability. As a college lacking a Disability Studies program or any substantive curricula addressing disability, it is essential that Vassar at least facilitates accessible environments, even if intellectual accessibility is yet to be incorporated.

Hi Finley! I appreciate that you also used Cirrus visualizations in Voyant – they are probably my favorite visualization the site offers. The Cirrus is an elegant exploratory static visualization that quickly and beautifully conveys data frequency and content using scale and color. While explanatory and dynamic visualizations are better for giving more complex and multi-layered understandings of the data, the Cirrus is a fantastic preliminary way to gather insights and perform text analysis.

I love that your team has chosen ArcGIS as the platform for its geospatial data mapping because, like the complexity of urban accessibility, ArcGIS accommodates multiple dimensionalities. The platform's ability to map in 2D and 3D, manipulate layers and styles, and control map scale allows for many positionalities from which to view any given topic. These alternate vantages can illuminate sublimated contours of a project or contrast dominant viewpoints, embracing a pluralistic approach to projecting geographic space into disability studies. This project is especially exciting because your team's geospatial mapping scheme accommodates the geographic nature of the built environment, matching the visualization's content with its medium. Jen Jack Giesing said in last week's reading "Where are We?" that GIS projects "promote education, conversation, and representation on behalf of the common good in the public sphere" (646), with this project pitch being an excellent example of that ideal.

I love that your group is working with the expansive history of gendered higher education, not just at HWCs but also historically men's institutions, while considering gender-exclusive colleges' intersection with race in HBCs. That you mention your three schools (Hamilton, W&L, and Vassar) have traditionally run the gamut of gender exclusivity while still considering identities outside gender lends to a thoroughly-conceptualized, compellingly-explored topic pitch synthesizing the archival power of three expansive libraries. Your systematized division of Research Questions, Sources, Methods, and Presentation also indicates a high degree of organization that will lend to methodological success. I also appreciate your group's plans to utilize every platform our class has explored thus far, approaching this research topic through quantitative, geographic, literary, and data analysis to ensure a thorough investigation of intersectional accessibility to U.S. higher education.

Thank you for broaching this distinction, Dohyeon! The dichotomy of scholarly and non-scholarly raises intriguing questions for analyzing mapping projects. Is scholarship synonymous with scientific modes of inquiry, or should it be considered scholastic methodology to go beyond the scientific method? Humanities fields often don't correspond with natural sciences. Nonetheless, approaches to humanist inquiry, such as "How Your Hometown Affects Your Chances of Marriage" often involve rigorous scientific processes, including drafting a hypothesis, collecting information, analyzing its quality, retesting when necessary, and cleaning the results. Digital Humanities blurs the distinction even further, melding the scientific world of data with a field often considered antithetical to science. I believe the scholars' intentionality in achieving their results, not scientific methods, should define proper scholarship. Nevertheless, a loose distinction could leave room for ambiguity and poorly-staged inquiries. I am interested in exploring this question by creating our class projects!

That a tool as objective and superficially-obvious as a map can be a vehicle for storytelling, artistic expression, and subjective experience demonstrates data visualization's abstract and pliable nature. Before enrolling in Vassar's multidisciplinary Media Studies program, I never considered the stories a map could tell. My theoretical research has helped me understand that art emerges in data; likewise, data can manifest as potent, mobilizing art. Dougherty and Ilyankou's explanation of this flexibility reminds me of media theorist Marshall McLuhan's famous statement, "the medium is the message." While the technical content of maps may not necessarily deliver a storytelling experience, the map's inclusion, omission, and modification of formal cartographic elements convey specific stories, intentionally or not. "Hands-On Data Visualization" demonstrates how a medium can comprise similar data while manipulating its formation and delivery to create disparate visualizations, such as highlighting resident anecdotes to displaying 3D maps.

Thanks for this illuminating blog post on "The Prophet," Anshika. This line is compelling because it outlines where we should strive to draw the boundary or attempt to reconcile the theoretical approaches of the humanities and data science. Can we explore elements of symbolism or allegory through quantitative analysis and visualization, or can we only understand thematic matter and figurative language through a historical-cultural humanities lens? Even if we can gather quantitative data using tools like Voyant, does its power extend past being a substantiating point of evidence in literary research? I am unsure how to answer these questions myself, but your blog post brought them to my mind – I hope we can explore them as a class in the coming weeks and, with any luck, come to a collective conclusion. Thanks so much, Anshika!

One of the most potent collaborative forces within digital humanities is asynchronous, collective forms of collation editing. Sites enabling this approach, such as Juxta Commons and Google Docs, allow contributors to work together and understand each other's editorial, written, and humanistic perspectives. Collation editing prevents implicit biases and zombie data by incorporating a multiplicity of voices from varying positionalities and minoritized groups, also enabling the vulnerability and candidness inherent in the creation process that breaks past prejudice and preconceptions. Walsh's approach and focus on reflecting the "interpretive possibilities offered by differences" highlight how digital collation lets editors reflect on the difference between themselves and their varying styles informed by diverging experiential perspectives, thereby increasing tolerance and creating an end product following data justice principles.