Toolkit: GIS

GIS stands for Geographic Information System. GIS uses computer programs to view and analyze geographic data ranging from landforms to demographic information. You can use GIS to look at differences in population statistics (age, occupation, ethnicity, gender) across regions ranging from census tracts to nations; to create buffer zones in areas being developed that will protect endangered species, waterways, or archaeological sites; to take spot measurements and create a topographic map... there are an almost endless amount of possibilities.

In archaeology, GIS is often used to predict the locations of archaeological sites. Pre-contact and early historic sites, for example, are often found on relatively flat land associated with certain soil types and within a certain distance of fresh water. Using topographic, hydrologic, and soils data downloaded from the web, archaeologists can tell the program to identify these high-sensitivity areas. For historic sites, early maps can be pulled into GIS and overlaid on the modern geography to see where early buildings were located.

Thinking about Wiawaka using ArcGIS 10. The spidery lines on the map are railroads.

I'll be using GIS a few different ways at Wiawaka. These include: mapping site features (using location data taken by GPS or using a total station); overlaying historic maps and aerial photographs to look at how the character of the property changed over time; soils analysis for drainage and productivity for agriculture to think about the farming and location of buildings and utilities; and looking at who the visitors to Wiawaka were using the guestbooks and census data (where they lived, occupation, age, etc.). More on this last example in my next post!

One of the most commonly used commercial GIS programs is the ArcGIS suite by ESRI. It's expensive, though they do offer a free 60-day trial if you want to check it out (or use their tutorial to learn some of the GIS basics). There are open source (free) options, however, including GRASS which I will be checking out soon!

Toolkit: Atlas.ti

 I thought I'd share some of the tools we're using on this project. When most people think about archaeological tools, they think about tools we use in the field -- shovels, dustpans, brushes, etc. Those help us get our information out of the ground; but then we have to make sense of it.

One of the challenges of the Wiawaka Project is the massive amounts of data that need to (and will need to be) both managed and analyzed. This information includes the layout of the property including building and roadway locations (and former locations); excavated data (what artifacts were found where -- both horizontally across the site and vertically in time); photographs (contemporary and historical); maps (historic, modern, and site plans); primary documents (guest registers, meeting minutes, census data); secondary documents (other writers talking about Wiawaka or other similar sites); background research (similar sites, general historic context, information about the Girls' Friendly Society, information about Troy, information about factory workers at the time, etc. etc.); the list is almost endless, and overwhelming. Not only do we have to keep track of all these various pieces of information, we have to be able to make connections between it all; to make sense of it.

Atlas.ti splash screen, waiting for data to be entered!

Atlas.ti is a qualitative data analysis (qualitative = descriptive data, vs. quantitative = numerical data)  program that allows us to identify themes or threads across many types and formats of document (types = as described above; formats = .pdf, .doc, .jpg, etc. etc.). These are flagged in each document pulled into the program using codes. Once data has been coded in documents (there will be hundreds thousands of documents for the Wiawaka Project; indeed, I have hundreds of site and research photographs already...), Atlas.ti can be used to pull out information matching those codes (themes) from *all* the documents so it can be looked at all together. Relationships between the codes can be made as well, so the program can pull out related themes -- again from across all the documents, or just a subset of them. Making sense of the data comes next, but the program will make it easy to find relevant data.

As a bonus, the program keeps track of where all the digital sources are on my hard-drive. Which makes it easier for me to manage the data storage (rather than building a massive set of relational databases on my own).

I've not used the program before, but will be getting some hands-on practice as part of one of my courses. I am very excited by the organizational solutions the program provides, and the way it will allow me to pull at different threads in the data to help make sense of it.