Joshua Foster HIST 390 Blog

PPT: Final Project HIST 390

Introduction

1948… This was the year the United Nations began to recognise Israel as an independent Jewish state within the Middle East, but what does that really mean?  This means that the country will practice and uphold Jewish traditions and religion. As if the Middle East didn’t already have enough conflict on its own, a Jewish state had to rise amidst the chaos.  This did not fare well with the neighbouring countries, as they were Arab nations, resulting an in an immediate attack on the newly independent Jewish state.  Egypt, Lebanon, Syria & Iraq all attacked Israel on the day of independence, creating worry about the state’s survival.  One thing Israel had that these attacking nations didn’t was the ability to make a coordinated attack, and so they did.  This led to Israel’s military victories, and as a result of this “War of Independence” and the United Nations, Israel was able to expand its territorial claim further into the Palestinian state.  Good for Israel, bad for the native Arabs.  This was only the beginning of this ongoing conflict.

In this project, I will address the attributing factors and discover why this conflict has not ended.

Defining the Conflict

It began with the UN sanctioning a refuge for the Jewish people in a place where there was already a population living.  This is the root of the conflict.  This is not wrong on behalf of the UN because at the time many Jews had undergone religious prosecution in Europe causing many to find a new place to seek refuge in order to avoid the genocidal war.  Zionism played a huge role in this migration by encouraging those affected by religious persecution to seek a new place to settle in historic Palestine.  When they began their migration, the Palestinian region was a territory of the British allowing for easy movement.  When the UN finally announced their act, destruction of the indigenous Arab people began attributing to the conflict.  After the “War of Independence” those Palestinians who had originally lived in the new state of Israel were barred from returning to their homes causing a huge population of refugees.  Those who stayed in the state of Israel were segregated and classified as 2nd class citizens.  These factors play a big role in the quick expansion of the conflict.  Basically, one group of refugees now had a new home; however, resulting in a new group of refugees created.  Israel was founded as a Jewish state, but what does that mean?  Equality has been a big thing in Israel, but due to religious differences institutional discrimination exists causing a bigger conflict between the Israelis and the Palestinians.  The goal of the Israeli government is to accumulate maximum land and resources which has caused them to expand into the Palestinian territories.  Although they state equality is a goal, they want the land for Jewish people, not the indigenous Arabs.  Within Israel, Jews receive privileges that the Palestinians would not even under the same circumstances.  Seeing as 20% of the population of Israel is Palestinian there is no doubt why the conflict is present.  Israel has been building Jewish communities within Gaza and the West Bank causing an unwanted diversity.  Finally resulting in the recurring pattern of control, repression and violence that we have today.

Concluding Statement

One might ask why this is relevant to them.  Israel is one of the strongest allies of the United States and if things ever got too bad there is no doubt that the United States would get involved resulting in a mass outbreak of violence in the Middle East.  If this conflict is not suppressed in the near future, we may be looking at a next world war.  Seeing as the Palestinians are backed by groups in Egypt, Syria and Jordan, Israel would most definitely need help in the event of a multinational conflict.  It is important to understand the basis of this conflict in order to seek an ending to it.  In my PowerPoint, I will address many of the factors attributing to the conflict.  This conflict will always be on the top of my head because its one of the longest ongoing conflicts.  Not even the Cold War can surpass this.  To find an end to this conflict would be a miracle for the world, but for now we can only look on to it as it affects the history of the world.

Brief Slide Explanations

1. Title Page
2. This page is a quote by George W. Bush indicating the grave importance of conflict in the Middle East and that we must seek peace.
3. My introduction slide is the same introduction that I have utilized in this blog, giving a little background on the conflict, but not spoiling it all.
4. This is the first of three of my map pages and this one shows the 12 original districts of the Palestinian region in 1946 and the partition of the United Nations as a result of Jewish refugees in the region.
5. This slide is a modern-day map from Google Earth.
6. My third map slide shows an overlay displaying how Israel has extended its boundaries into the Palestinian territories.  This is important because Israel has never really defined its borders.
7. This chart shows the number of Jewish people and Arab people that live in this region how they compare.  Its important to know this because its an attributing factor to the conflict.  The UN partitioned a huge piece of land for the Jewish people; however, the population of Arabs was greater than the Jews at the time of the partitioning.  Its impossible to squeeze a bigger number of people into a smaller place and not have conflict.
8. This is a basic graph to show the death toll of this ongoing conflict since 1930.
9. This slide just offers a few photos from the region.
10. This slide offers an analysis of a text from a scholarly journal.  I found this article very interesting as it offered some good incite on the root of the conflict.
11. This is my second analysis.  The article I read for this analysis offered me some good information on how the Jewish state accomplishes things and why they do the things they do.

Synthesized Relationship

When viewing the PowerPoint its easy to see why territorial issues have been a key contributor to the conflict between the Palestinians and the state of Israel.  The maps offer a visualization of how Israel has expanded its in lands into that of the Palestinians and the result can clearly be seen through the death toll graph.  The Israelis have received the full fledged support of the United States in almost everything they do and for that reason there has not been much criticism on what the state does in the region, whether its expanding into already populated land in order to make new Israeli communities or institutionally discriminate against the Palestinians in the region through segregation, etc.  The other graph on ethnicity is weaved into the thesis of studying the conflict by offering a visualization of how the balance of ethnicity has changed over the years as a result of the Partition of 1947 and other acts of violence or war in the region.  It can be said that its not morally right to discriminate against the Palestinians who make up about 50% of the region by forcing them into a ever-shrinking piece of land.  The analysis of the texts offer some incite on the conflict and why Israel does the things it does.  I’d like to conclude on the point that this conflict is not well portrayed through biased media and the root of this conflict is clearly territorial issues that will not be resolved until the land that has been taken through force is returned to indigenous Arabs.

Preservation Path

As for preservation I believe its very important to make sure that our important items stay secure and that they will always be available to us when necessary.  For this reason I would opt to use a digital form of preservation, not only because it is very convenient, but because I believe if a paper copy was made it would eventually be lost or the quality would degrade over time.  It might be fine to make one print copy for personal reference; however, I feel that the LOCKSS method of preservation would be a lot more reliable.  Whether its online or in a digital storage, its important that we save it in multiple places.

First, I would make a digital copy on my own hard drive and create an encrypted folder that could prevent hacking if I were ever to be a target of that.  After making the original digital copy on my hard drive, I would find a trusty memory drive that I could easily plug in and remove from the computer and save a digital copy on that as well as create an encrypted folder.  Its important to encrypt things in order to add a better protection against hackers and such.  After saving the two copies I’d post my presentation to multiple blogs as most blog sites seem to stay up for a long time.  I’d make sure all my blogs did not have the same password in order to be more secure.  I believe digital preservation offers a lot more security of analog preservation because we are in a world today where digitization has taken over.  One day we may even be able to access ANY book or project through digital sources.  Preservation and security will always play a huge role in a project like these because they are so easy to lose track of that one must be very diligent when planning to secure these.

After messing around with the Blockly Maze for quite a bit and checking out my classmates solutions I analyzed and simplified there solution to create one that may take a bit longer, but it gets the job done with the use of logic.  I noticed a lot of the class didn’t use a lot of of logic to simplify the commands.

Credits: Google Search for help on logic

Tips for Final Project:

• Start somewhere; couple maps that are tied together, etc.
• Start thinking about adding additional data as it comes

Programming

• Programming is what the software will do
• Instruction set (same for 30 years) for “how to add two numbers together”
• Each chip in a computer can execute commands and instructions (more CPU, more speed)
• Variables, Commands, Logic
• Variable can be anything (x,y)… often stored in memory… are variables so they can be changed
• Command is an instruction that tells the computer to act on variables… Math (- x + /), Strings (str 3-DAN-n), Algorithms (XOR… used to code and encrypt information)
• Logic… IF, THEN, WHILE… XoR(x,y)
• Think of variables as containers… they contain words we have, Commands to push containers to different places, Logic to dictate when stuff is happening
• What needs to happen in sequence logically to reach the end?

Scratch is very interesting program language.  It introduces an interactive side of programming, like stories, games music and art.  Prior to this weeks video and readings I had only heard small things about Scratch, but never really utilized the actual program.  I took this as an opportunity to mess around on it a bit.

It was a pretty fun application due to its simplicity.  It really sheds light on what people go through when they create digital games and programs.  The way movement is implemented and the way sound is added all just contributes a better digital understanding.  At first glance, this program might look a bit childish, but it really allows for simple digital creations after you get by the somewhat confusing first-time use.  The program is very to-the-point.  If you click something like Repeat (10), it will repeat the command 10 times.  I believe this will allow young people for a better understanding and practice of digital applications.

There’s really not many faults with the application from my experience.  I enjoyed using it to create basic digital animations… the only annoying part for me was drawing.  I’ve never been a big fan of “computer paint” programs.  I feel this is a very useful application for basic programming practice.

I find the LOCKSS method to be the most efficient way of preserving digital data.  There are a few things that must be kept in mind as technology continues to change.  One thing is the type of file that the photos are saved in.  If technology makes a new type of file for photos then I would have to update my files so that they are compatible with the new file type.  I’d make sure not all my saved places were internet sources either.  I’d utilize things like external hard drives and flash drives.  Seeing as I want to make the most out of my photos, I’d save as many as I could so that I can still make an accurate representation of my childhood.

Organization-wise, I’d organize each of them by the year they were taken so I’d be able to easily determine what I wanted to access.  I found the Digital Preservation page by the Library of Congress offers great techniques and ways to preserve digital files and I will utilize some of the tips like making a record where all of the photos are.  I feel that with good practice of digital preservation one can really make an impact on history.

Beginning this class I wasn’t sure what to expect and how we would learn about digital history because I never thought of it as a big thing in the world; however, now we’re a few weeks from the end of the semester and I have really got a hold on what we’re going over and what we can do to be a part in this epic digital era.  This article, by Roy Rosenzsweig, addresses the topic of preservation of history in the digital era.  How can we make sure that we will always be able to access to the digital version, like the analog version?

One thing that really caught my eye was when fragility was discussed.  This is very true, anything digital can be very fragile because just as easy as it goes up, it can come down.  The article addresses the specific example of the Bert is Evil website.  The creator began the site in 1996, accruing many fans as it progressed; however, on October 11, 2001, the site was deleted spurring interest in the fragility of the digital era.  This just goes to show that we are living in a time where one can simply remove what has been done and this poses a serious problem to the digitization of history.  In the future, if we want to have the possibility of digitizing history and putting the analog copies in storage, we need to address how we can preserve these, especially if its with important books or documents.

I believe that true preservation will only be possible when the government takes a step in this digital era.  Today, people can still take down websites, removing the past from our life.  The government should address this issue with caution because seeing as this era is only beginning, we need to make sure that our digital rights are not impaired through action.  Besides the government, it is one of our responsibilities to work towards preserving the past in this digital era.  The article really offered some good information on the preservation of the digital past.

I used Google Ngram to create a chart that shows the use of the word Jewish in comparison to the use of the word Hebrew between 1750 and 2000 in American English.  It was interesting to see that the word Jewish gained a lot of usage around the 1930-Present period.  This was most definitely impacted by WWII and the Holocaust… the term Hebrew seems to be pretty consistent throughout history.  Here is my chart:

Usage of Words

1. Multitude of meanings + meaning over time + across cultures
2. Context – correlations
3. Linguistic divides
4. Sourcing – books, magazines… a. timeliness b. literacy (read, write) c. Education d. Tech
5. Usage patterns
6. Preservation path
7. Optical Character Recognition (ex. suck vs fuck)

*Corpus – corpora… what makes it up

Not a real preservation path in some things… like Victorian books

Must look into where words are being used to make evaluation… for example the word ‘Marriage’ in American English vs British English

The first thing that caught my eye was the author of the article… Our professor, Daniel Cohen.  The idea of a syllabus finder is great and the article gives great information on how we can do this to make them more accessible to anyone who wanted to access the database.  The article also addresses H-Bot, which is a search engine that allows the user to ask historical questions using common language and with this it searches the web for an answer.

Syllabus Finder & H-Bot

Essentially, this is search engine designed to look up course materials using the user’s search keywords and criteria.  This would really help users to design their own syllabi because the users can gather information from each others.  This will make the job a lot less stressful and time consuming.  Just another way technology benefits professional life.  In my opinion, this will allow teachers to create a lot more complex syllabi and improve the way their classes are done with the help of other teachers and professors from around the world.  I can see this being very useful as long as teachers continue to upload their syllabi online.  Without online access to the syllabi, the search engine is rendered ineffective because it won’t be able to access the paper copies of the syllabi.

As I mentioned in the first paragraph, H-Bot is a search engine that allows the user to use common language to ask historical questions.  This search engine would be very useful when asking questions that aren’t too complex.  As mentioned in the article the Q & A mechanism is a lot more complex then just a simple search because it, literally, has to interpret the question of the user as well as search through the web for relevant documents.  I feel that this would be useful when asking basic questions such as where one was born or what year something happened; however, when it gets more complex the search engine is not human, it’ll interpret your question, but you might get an wrong answer, resulting in an ineffective search.

In conclusion, I feel that both of these search engines offer good services that will be utilized by teachers and those seeking answers to basic questions.

I did my presentation on the tsunami of 2004 which impacted 14 countries throughout Asia.  This tsunami was labeled sixth most dangerous natural disaster in history.  I chose this topic because I was living in Japan at the time and as soon as this struck Southeast Asia we began collecting donations at my school to help those effected by this disastrous act of nature.

Historical Presentation