Chad Buterbaugh
PhD Student
Folklore
Project: Contemporary Irish Narrative Performance
Chad’s project explores the role of websites in the artistic lives of Irish storytellers. He considers the CMS [Cloud-based Web] as a piece of communicative technology common to the life of Irish folklore in the 21st century. His research questions ask: How does digital infrastructure help or hinder fundamental folkloric processes like tradition and variation? How does the non-geographic performers’ community exist and maintain itself using online tools? What are the limits and benefits of the CMS in helping storytellers establish themselves as experts in narrative performance? And finally, what role does commodification play in the diffusion of traditional Irish narratives to international audiences?
Tassie Gniady
PhD in English Literature
MIS Student
Project: Information Visualization with the IQ Wall
This project is focused on information visualization. As the graduate assistant for the new IQ Wall in Wells Library, I will be reaching out to the IU community to host exhibits, talks, and interactive events. In addition, I hope to curate some exhibits that take advantage of the 12 million pixels the wall has to offer. Specifically, I foresee Neatline and Simile as offering spacial and chronological mappings the wall would display to well. As my personal hobby horse is John Milton, I expect he will make an appearance on the wall, but I am also contemplating an exhibit of born-digital objects.
David Nemer
PhD student
Social Informatics
Project: Rethinking Digital Inequalities: the experience of the marginalized in community technology centers.
In recent years, Brazilian policy has been informed by a techno-enthusiastic vision, as in the idea that access to using digital technologies (DTs) is a right of citizenship in the information age. Consequently, a number of programs have been instituted to promote access to DT use and decrease a perceived “digital divide.” However, numerous scholars have disputed such technological deterministic visions, which presume that mere access to DTs is sufficient to promote digital inclusion which in turn leads to social and economic transformation. They argue that such approaches simply reflect pre-existing social divides and, sometime, even widen them. David Nemmer’s research investigates Brazil’s access to DTs programs critically—how in practice they entail both potential and pitfalls. He is particularly concerned to illuminate the complex relationship between digital and social inclusion—whether such programs actually lead to social inclusion of the marginalized, if so, how, and in which dimensions (health, education, democracy, financial, etc.). His method is qualitative exploration of state-supported LAN Houses and Telecentros located inside slums and low-income neighborhoods in the city of Victoria.
Liza Wallace
BA student
IU Jacobs School of Music
Project: Multimedia for Contemporary Harp Compositions
I propose a multi-media performance and video project with the goal of producing at least three music videos. I am a harpist, singer, and composer and would like to create a visual record of my music for youtube and other internet forums. In making these videos, I will tape performances of my music at unique venues such as Jazz clubs and outdoor spaces. My performances will involve my harp and voice joined by percussion and melodic instruments depending on the song.
I will be recording my own compositions which draw from Latin, Jazz, Balkan, and American Folk music influences. Along with the other musicians, I will be working with video artists and sound engineering students in a collaborative process that ideally will be a learning experience for everyone involved. I hope to use these videos to promote music which I feel is unique and important to Jazz and Popular genres. Harp does not yet have a strong place in contemporary music. I wish to change this with my compositions, integrating my harp and voice through Jazz harmonies combined with Latin rhythms and original song lyrics. This project would be a way for my work to gain exposure and also to work in a collaborative and creative process with other artists.
