Empowering citizens to tell their own stories – the Cultural Objects In Networked Environments (COINE) project
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/03055720210474262 |
| Date | 01 September 2002 |
| Published date | 01 September 2002 |
| Pages | 31-36 |
| Author | Zoe Clarke |
| Subject Matter | Information & knowledge management |
Empowering citizens
to tell their own stories
± the Cultural Objects
In Networked
Environments (COINE)
project
by Zoe Clarke, CERLIM
Keywords: Education, Digital libraries,
Computer architectures
Abstract: This paper introduces the reader
to the Cultural Objects In Networked
Environments (COINE) project. The concept
and aims of the project are explained,
together with the technical challenges facing
the project consortium. The proposed
software technical architecture is then
presented. The second part of the paper
presents possible COINE system application
scenarios in educational settings at four
demonstration sites.
Introduction
Information and Communications Technologies
(ICTs) offer the potential to turn citizens-as-
customers into citizens-as-participants, actively
contributing their own histories, knowledge,
understandings and experiences to the digital
record of their countries' cultural heritage. They
offer the possibility of enabling individuals and
local communities to capture, display, share and
preserve their cultures in new ways, thus
personalising both the publication and the use of
information objects and exploring new inter-
community linkages. However, robust, scalable
and easy to use solutions are needed to achieve
this.
Cultural Objects In Networked Environments
(COINE) will empower European citizens to tell
their own stories. It will provide software to
create structured, World Wide Web-based
environments which are hospitable to local
cultural activity, but which allow content to be
shared locally, regionally, nationally and
internationally. The COINE software will
provide facilities for rendering everyday objects
± texts, images, sound files and so on ± digitally.
It will provide a framework for the creation and
maintenance of descriptions (metadata) and
dynamic links to other collections.
Demonstration sites will test the software in
different cultural settings across Europe,
including schools and citizens' groups.
The COINE project
The COINE project is operational from March
2002 to August 2004, and is co-ordinated by the
Centre for Research in Library and Information
Management (CERLIM), based at Manchester
Metropolitan University. The project Web site
can be found at .
The project is part-funded by the European
Commission Information Society Technologies
(IST) Programme. It is one of four projects
funded under the ``Heritage for All'' action line,
the focus of which is to foster sustainable online
communities to create and document the digital
record of their societies, including safeguarding
its accessibility for the future. Information on
these projects can be found at
www.cordis.lu/ist/ka3/digicult/en/
projects.html>.
Challenges
The following is a summary of some of the major
challenges for the COINE project consortium:
.The capture and storage of heterogeneous
digital objects and digital representations
of real objects (including people) to create
coherent, navigable and attractive
``landscapes''.
.The description of such objects and
collections in ways which facilitate
interoperability both with other
collections and with the wider digital
world, and in particular issues of metadata
granularity in such environments.
#MCB UP Limited, ISSN 0305-5728, DOI 10.1108/03055720210474262
VINE, Volume 32 Number 3 2002, Issue 128 Ð 31
.The inclusion of references to external
objects, either where they cannot be held
in the domain or where it is more efficient
to reference them, including the ability to
include personalised annotations attached
to objects.
.The introduction and operation of
meaningful quality descriptors for such
objects in ways that ensure that personal
collections have value to others.
.The ability to navigate through
descriptions of individual collections and
databases in order to target queries within
the distributed resource base.
.The ability to simultaneously query large
numbers of individual metadata stores.
.The ability to present consolidated result
sets to the user.
.The ability to route queries intelligently
between sets of databases.
.The use of distributed thesauri to expand
the user's query.
.Issues relating to the digital ``ecology''
such as privacy and rights management.
.The persistence and preservation of
objects and their surrogates over time.
The COINE software is being designed to address
such questions in non-expert environments where
the level of technical expertise may be low, in
order to create exploitation opportunities across a
wide population and to gain the active
involvement of citizens in creating, maintaining
and making available content.
The COINE software development is taking
place within the context of existing and emerging
standards, as it needs to address the broader
issues of interoperability, scalability and
sustainability. It is envisaged that the project's
findings will assist the development of standards
for structured deployment and retrieval of digital
resources in distributed networked environments.
Thus a COINE domain, an operational instance of
the COINE software, will also impose standards.
For example, the provenance and quality
characteristics of objects held in a COINE domain
must be known and displayed to users. The
inclusion of metadata content standards will ensure
that objects can be identified across any number of
such domains. As a result objects within a COINE
domain are representative of the chosen local
culture and are controlled locally ± but are surfaced
within a global networked space. In effect, COINE
domains act as local art galleries, local archives,
local museums, local history centres, and so on.
COINE technical architecture
The COINE technical architecture is designed to
solve two specific problems:
(1) Seamless access to very highly distributed
resources ± this covers issues such as:
.Repository navigation ± providing
interfaces to allow users to navigate
through descriptions of individual
repositories/databases in order to
target queries within the distributed
resource base.
.Broadcast metadata querying ± the
ability to simultaneously query large
numbers of individual metadata stores
and present consolidated results to the
user.
.Intelligent query routeing ± the ability
to route queries intelligently between
sets of databases b ased upon what the
user is querying and forward
knowledgeabout the general content of
each database within the environment.
.Thesaurus expansion through
distributed thesauri ± the ability to
expand the user's query through
distributed thesauri accessed through
standard protocol interfaces.
(2) Provision of a highly distributed meta-
data- and data-publishing platform ± this
covers issues such as:
.Resource XML Schema ± provision of
an XML schema and distributable
authoring tool for resource metadata
creation. This will be based around the
Open Archives Protocol
www.openarchives.org/>.
32 Ð VINE, Volume 32 Number 3 2002, Issue 128
Empowering citizens to tell their own stories ± the Cultural Objects In Networked Environments (COINE ) project
.Repository XML schema ± similar
provision of an XML schema and
distributable authoring tool for meta-
data creation at the repository level.
This will form the basis of repository
navigation.
.Harvesting of metadata in OAI-
compliant repositories, along with
repository level metadata, into
searchable databases which form the
basis of COINE's value-added service
provision.
.Search protocol for the value added
services, using ANSI Z39.50
www.loc.gov/z3950/agency/> to
retrieve XML metadata records which
include an item identifier which will
provide access to individual items
(digital objects) in repositories.
.Localised query expansion through
distributed thesaurus access, based on
the ZTHES Z39.50 profile
zthes.z3950.org/>.
In addition to the technical infrastructure issues
COINE addresses content personalisation from
two angles:
(1) ``My COINE'' ± the ability to personalise
the user's portal on to the COINE service
in terms of cosmetics, target data sources,
interest profiles etc.
(2) ``My Archive'' ± the ability for users to
publish their data into the COINE
environment in a controlled manner. This
will use an adapted version of the OAI
PERL libraries which provide an OAI-
compliant front-end to existing databases.
The development work will focus on the
needs of the COINE domain ± cultural
objects ± as opposed to existing
implementations which have focused on
electronic print archives.
The COINE project consortium
The project consortium consists of the following
partners:
.The Centre for Research in Library and
Information Management (CERLIM) at
the Manchester Metropolitan University,
UK, working with the Armitt Museum and
Library, Ambleside, Cumbria (UK).
.Fretwell Downing Informatics (UK).
.The National Microelectronics
Application Centre Ltd (Ireland).
.Ennis Information Age Town Ltd
(ENNIS) (Ireland).
.Universita Oberta de Catalunya (Spain).
.The University of Macedonia (Greece).
.The Jagiellonian University, Krakow
(Poland).
COINE: demonstration sites
and scenarios
The COINE partners have invited a number of
varied cultural and educational institutions to act
as COINE demonstrator sites to undertake a
Europe-wide series of challenging
implementations of the system. Partners and
demonstration sites have already identified a
wide range of possible application scenarios, and
the following are a selection that involve
educational institutions.
The Armitt Museum and Library, UK
The Armitt Museum and Library in Ambleside,
Cumbria, England has a history going back over
100 years, having been founded by the Armitt
sisters, who lived in Ambleside and had
connections with many of the leading British
literary figures of the time (such as Ruskin and
Rawnsley, and less directly Wordsworth,
Coleridge et al.). They collected material relating
to the literary scene of the day as well as that
pertaining to the English Lake District ±
Ambleside is in the heart of this area, one of the
most beautiful and most visited parts of England.
Over time the Armitt added to its original
collections, as it still does.
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Empowering citizens to tell their own stories ± the Cultural Objects In Networked Environments (COINE) project
Within the COINE project, the Armitt will be
helping its local citizens to tell their stories using
networked information tools developed within the
project. The idea behind the following scenario is
to encourage young children to use the COINE
domain to tell their own stories. The children
would be attending the local primary school and it
is expected that work with COINE could be
incorporated into the national curriculum ± this
needs to be discussed with the head and teachers
who would be involved. The age of the children
would be between five and 11 years.
The children have been set a project to research
their own stories ± who they are and from where
their families came. The aim would be to provide
some material from the Armitt collections ± this
might include copies of old maps of the town or
old photographs. Children will be encouraged to
provide much of the material themselves ± this
could be from family photograph albums, birth,
marriage and death certificates and so on. Other
material will be retrieved from the Web or other
online resources.
Using databases available on the Web they will
look up their own names and find a reference
(probably on a genealogy site). They will also
find the latest national census information for the
house in which they live, if this is available (if
not, they might use another local entry as an
example). Working together in small groups they
will each take photographs of themselves and
their immediate families. They will find out
where they were born and find a digital
photograph of that village, town or city. They
will record (orally, creating digital audio files)
their earliest memory. They will draw pictures of
any pets they have and these will be scanned.
They will write a short narrative to link all of this
together. This could then be linked to schools in
other countries, e.g. the sharing of stories
between twinned towns.
Sources to be provided to or by COINE
domain
.Genealogical database access ± download
record of appropriate single entry.
.Census data for their house/area.
.Digital photograph of family and self.
.Digital photograph of place of birth.
.Digital audio file of their earliest memory.
.Scanned image of drawings of pets.
.Text narrative.
Issues
There are questions of ownership and copyright.
Also where children are involved it may be
necessary to acquire parental consent to the use
of ``private'' material.
Where children are involved in placing materials
on the system it is important that full parental
consent is obtained and that the individual child
cannot be identified unless an explicit and informed
decision has been taken in each individual case to
allow this. It is particularly important that care is
exercised in including photographs of children
taking part and under no circumstances should the
child's home address be obtainable.
The amount of time needed from the school may
be problematic. It may prove difficult for the
school to give enough time for the pupils to
develop the narratives themselves. It may be
preferable that, whilst the material could be
researched anywhere, it should be put together in
school, as this would ensure a standard of quality
and supervision.
Gaelscoil MhõÂcõÂl ChõÂosoÂg, Ireland
Gaelscoil MhõÂcõÂl ChõÂosoÂg is an Irish-speaking
primary school (children age four/five-12 years)
established in 1983. The school has eight teachers
and 200 pupils. All subjects are taught through
Irish, the national language. The school places
strong emphasis on promoting Irish culture and
language and is active in traditional music and
dance, sport (hurling) and drama (dramaiochta).
The school has a strong oral and story-telling
culture and has strong links with cultural
organisations in the community. Their school
dramas, which they stage annually, have won
numerous national competitions. The promotion
of Irish language and culture is encouraged in
pupils' homes also.
The school's scenario is the pupils' perception of
what it is like to be part of the living culture of
Ireland ± how they perceive their language and
music, how it forms part of their identity. They
are a minority group, preserving the Irish
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Empowering citizens to tell their own stories ± the Cultural Objects In Networked Environments (COINE ) project
language for future generations. Their music and
drama are steeped in history yet with many
modern influences and it is the changing nature
of their culture that they would like to capture.
They would like to share their culture with other
schools and regions, particularly through the
medium of drama and music. The pupils would
like to tell their individual stories and record the
school's music and drama and develop a school
archive.
The children in the school are very creative and
original material ± art, music, song, stories ± is
produced on a regular basis. Parents in the school
have a huge photographic archive of the pupils
and major school events which could be digitised.
There are also numerous videos available.
The Burren College of Art, Ireland
The Burren, in County Clare, has long been a
source of inspiration for artists of all genres ±
poets, novelists, painters, sculptors, musicians
and playwrights. They have all absorbed its
spectacular bare and stony beauty and created a
multitude of rich works which continue to be
enjoyed and appreciated. Some names of those
who have been so inspired include W.B. Yeats,
the acclaimed Irish-Australian painter, Sir Sidney
Nolan, Richard Long, the English artist, and
Seamus Heaney, the internationally renowned
contemporary Irish poet. Sir John Betjeman also
tried to capture the mystical beauty of the Burren
in his work.
The mission of Burren College of Art is to
provide the highest quality education in the visual
arts within the unique and sensitive landscape of
the Burren, County Clare. Its location alone is
unsurpassed in terms of historical,
archaeological, geological, cultural and botanical
interest. In addition, the study programmes it
provides have been designed to allow young
artists to work in a communal environment. Set in
the grounds of a sixteenth century castle against
the stunning backdrop of the Burren, the Burren
College of Art was founded in 1993 after years of
planning and research on an international scale.
The Burren College of Art offers a range of full-
time fine arts programmes for individual
students, graduates and groups of students. Its
programmes are designed for dedicated, aware
art students wishing to broaden and advance their
perception and methods. Just as Irish poets are
adept in revealing emotional truths through
expressions rooted in the earth, the Burren
College feels students can greatly improve their
artistic talent through sincere investigation of
landscape. Art produced by the College students
reflects their surroundings and in doing so is also
a reflection of contemporary Irish culture.
The Burren College of Art scenario involves
using the COINE software to assist it in archiving
students' work and providing a method of show-
casing the creativity of its students. This is
particularly important as the College has develop
a reputation as a centre of excellence ±
particularly in the USA. The Burren College of
Art wishes to participate in COINE as the project
would allow the college to develop its Art archive
in a structured and user-friendly format.
16th Gymnasium School of Thessaloniki,
Greece
The school is located in the western area of the
city, an area characterized by a variety of
citizens: either Greek people who used to live in
other countries and have recently returned to
Greece, or emigrants from Balkan countries.
In this multicultural environment Eleni Batsiou, a
teacher at the school, had the idea of producing a
book of recipes with contributions from pupils
and teachers. The idea had several direct and
indirect goals such as: attracting children to visit
the new school library, engaging children (and
teachers) in an interesting and amusing activity,
and helping foreign children to get involved in
the life of the school.
The response was good, with children from two
other schools that are hosted in the same building
also contributing material. In December 2001, a
cook-book with about 100 recipes from ten
countries or areas was produced. The origin of
the recipes relates either to people who have been
living in, or visited, these countries or areas, or to
people working in special restaurants.
The multicultural environment of the school gave
Eleni another idea: to call children from all three
schools to tell their family story up to three
generations back. This activity is now taking
place, and the response is also at a very high
level. Children are telling their family story and
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Empowering citizens to tell their own stories ± the Cultural Objects In Networked Environments (COINE) project
bringing additional material (photos etc.) to
enhance it.
These two scenarios, the recipe book and the
family stories, will be made available in digitised
form through the COINE system, thus making
them available world-wide. None of the schools
is able to undertake the role of a COINE domain
host. Therefore, the University of Macedonia, a
COINE project partner and COINE domain host,
will do the digitization, hosting and preservation
of their material.
Issues
Copyright issues will need to be settled with
Eleni Batsiou and the pupils who contributed to
the recipe book.
In order to protect the children's rights, all the
schools requested the signing of a statement from
parents in which it is clearly stated that they give
their consent to the school to publish their
material on to the COINE network with the
limitation that the contributing child (or children)
must not be identified in the published material
with their real names but only with a pseudonym.
In addition, the statement also specifies that,
apart from the nominal identification, other
elements that would contribute to the
identification of the material's originator family,
such as the studying year of the pupil, or the
home address, must not be included, or implied in
the published material.
Conclusion
These scenarios from project part ners in the UK,
Ireland and Greece, give an ide a of the type of
applications for which the COIN E system could
be used in educational setting s. Each
contributing group is local and spec ific to a
region; however, their storie s and cultural
heritage are likely to be of interest to the wide r
European and international c ommunities. The
publication of their material on th e Web will
mean their stories are available world-wide, and
this will enable other inter ested citizens to find
out about them.
Thus the COINE project enables the exploration
of new concepts in ``information inclusion'' by
encouraging the ordinary citizen to become
involved in Network-based sharing of experience
and heritage. It does so within a firmly standards-
based framework, thus working towards
widespread interoperability and long-term
sustainability.
The COINE project currently has another 18
months to run, during which the software will be
developed and extensively tested by the project
partners and demonstration sites. Results will be
made available on the project Web site.
Contact details
ZoeÈ Clarke, Research Associate, Centre for
Research in Library and Information
Management, Department of Information and
Communications, The Manchester Metropolitan
University, Geoffrey Manton Building,
Rosamond Street West, Manchester M15 6LL.
Tel: +44 161 247 6142; Fax: +44 161 247 6979.
E-mail: z.clarke@mmu.ac.uk www.cerlim.ac.uk/
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Empowering citizens to tell their own stories ± the Cultural Objects In Networked Environments (COINE ) project
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