Have you ever wondered if the historical story told in a
Hollywood film or Historica-Dominion Institute Heritage Minute has been
exaggerated? Chances are that it
probably has been. This is something
that I, as a presenter and observer, of history through social media, am
particularly interested in. Throughout
this blog I hope to explore some examples of the good, the not so good and
potentially propose some strategies that will help other ‘Twitterhistorians’
and those like us on other media to tell the stories that we hold near and dear
without need or cause for exaggeration simply to gain the interest of the
public.
As this blog post is serving as a simple introduction to
this ‘enjeux’ I propose to present to you several examples of feeds that I have
observed and analyzed in the past, and that I hope to continue working on
throughout this course and into the future.
My medium of choice at the moment is Twitter, but as many of these
‘Twitterhistorians’ also rely on other digital resources the chances are that
the stories will often take their readers far from the confines of 140
characters.
I am very interested in what I refer to as ‘real-time’
tweeting of historical events. There are
many ‘Twitterhistorians’ who tell historical stories in the present as if the
event is occurring at the same time as the other events and stories that are
being told on users’ Twitter feeds. It
may sound complicated but once you’ve had a chance to explore some of these
feeds I feel like you’ll come to understand the concept and ultimately, the
underlying tension that is one of my main concerns and interests.
1.
The first set of users that I want to introduce
you to are currently ‘real-time’ tweeting the War of 1812. Quite popular in this time and area (I write
from Ontario) with each event being tweeted about ‘exactly’ 200 years after it
happened.
a.
@Warof1812Live
b.
@1813now (was @1812now)
c.
@1812_Real_Time
2.
This
particular user is ‘real-time’ tweeting World War II. This project has been running for over a year
now and was my introduction to this idea
a.
@RealTimeWWII
There are other groups who tweet about history using cues
like ‘TDIH’ (This Day in History) etc. but it is those who tweet about history
as if it is happening in ‘this’ current time that interest me most. That said, the former group interests me as
they often rely on anniversaries and links to historical figures, places and
events to cue their messaging – a social media strategy that has its pros and
cons. I’ll also spend some time
investigating this and looking at how different groups present the same
historical information in different ways and look at user response.
I welcome all comments (hopefully positive!) and
constructive criticism as I may some day take this work to another level and
hope to have a really solid foundation.
I also realize, especially upon reading your short introductions (of
those of you also in the Algonquin course), that not everyone interested in
social media strategies is into history so I’d be keen to hear how strategies
may differ or align despite different goals.
Cheers,
Rebecca
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