Archive for the ‘Project Updates’ Category
New Teaching Resource: 100 Views of Climate Change
I have added a new site, 100 Views of Climate Change, to Teaching and Public Communication – Links.
Here is the description from the DISCCRS newsletter:
“100 Views of Climate Change (http://changingclimates.colostate.edu) is a website for climate-change education and outreach. This site was recently reorganized and includes annotations and links to videos, podcasts, books, articles, essays, and websites that convey high-quality information in clear and appealing ways to non-specialist adults, including college-level students, their teachers, and the interested public. The range is multidisciplinary, ranging from climate science to ecology, agriculture to ethics, communication to policy, economics to energy.”
While mainly focused on contemporary change, the site contains some useful resources for climate history as well.
Audio Walk to Reveal the Climatic History of a British Beauty Spot
(Cross-posted from Meteohistory.org)
A new audio walk to help walkers at a Cumbrian beauty spot to unlock its rich history and learn about the dramatic climate and weather conditions that shape its landscape developed by University of Nottingham researchers.
The audio walk, which has been written by a team Georgina Endfield, Lucy Veale, Gary Priestnall, Sam Meek and Simon Naylor (Univeristy of Exeter) and will be narrated by legendary weather broadcaster and former Met Office stalwart John Kettley, who will guide visitors on a 10-mile walk up Great Dun Fell, the second highest hill in the English Pennines.
An experimental smartphone app to accompany the walk is also being developed by the team. The creation of the walk and app has been funded as part of an ongoing project funded by Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) Weather Walks and Weather Talks: Exploring Popular Climate Histories and Futures. The walk is part of the Royal Geographical Society’s (with the Institute of British Geographers) Discovering Britain project aimed at encouraging the public to explore the stories behind Britain’s landscapes.
The team is currently recruiting volunteers for testing the walk and associated app in the Spring and would be delighted to hear from people interested in participating.
For further information, please contact:
Danielle Moore-Chick, AHRC: 01793 416021 d.moore-chick@ahrc.ac.uk
Emma Thorne, University of Nottingham: 0115 951 5793emma.thorne@nottingham.ac.uk
1. More information is available on the web at:http://www.discoveringbritain.org/walks/region/north-west-england/great-dun-fell.html (opens in a new window)
Updates to Bibliographic Database
Thanks to help from a new research assistant (thanks Lucia!) , I have been making a number of updates and additions to the Zotero bibliographical database, including scores of recent publications on historical climate reconstructions and impacts. Remember that the the database is public and searchable, and set up through an open platform so that anyone can contribute. Please click on the link or e-mail me if you’re interested. <sam.white(at)oberlin.edu>
Podcast Series: Climate in Canadian and Global History
From H-Environment:
“We are pleased to announce the launch of our special podcsat series, “Nature’s Past: Histories of Canadian Environmental Issues” and the first part of this series, which looks at global warming. With support from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, the Network in Canadian History and Environment, the Robarts Centre for Canadian Studies, and Canada’s History magazine, we will be producing a six-part special series. Through this series we will examine historical perspectives on a number of different pertinent environmental issues for Canadians.
On this episode of the podcast, we hold a round-table discussion about the role of climate in Canadian and global history with James Daschuk, Joshua MacFadyen, and Dagomar Degroot. We also speak with Ross Coen, author of the recently published book Breaking Ice for Arctic Oil: The Epic Voyage of the SS Manhattan through the Northwest Passage.
To download this episode, please visit:
http://niche-canada.org/naturespast
To subscribe to the series, visit:
http://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewPodcast?id=300588593
To follow the podcast on Twitter, visit:
http://twitter.com/naturespast“
New Links and Projects
This week, I have added links to the University of South Carolina projects in historical climatology (currently http://artsandsciences.sc.edu/geog/research/climatelab/historical/historical4.html) under “Projects and Databases” and the new blog for the Rachel Carson Center (http://seeingtheforest.org/) under “Member Blogs.” Thanks to Cary Mock and Jenny Seifert for bringing these to my attention!
New Historical Climate Research Database: Tambora
The Climate and Environmental History Collaborative Research Database (Tambora) is now online at <Tambora.org>. Tambora provides a database-supported infrastructure enabling the collaborative work on the interpretation of climate information derived from historical sources. The key information to be stored within the system is the original text quotation together with a bibliographic reference, place, time and coded information on climate and environment derived from the quote. The database has taken over information formerly on HISKILD and should build more data and functionality in the coming months.
NCAR Climate Data Guide
The National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) has launched a tool for searching and evaluating climate data sets. NCAR explains the Climate Data Guide as “the go-to source for scientifically sound information and advice on the strengths, limitations, and applications of climate data. Experts who construct, evaluate, and compare climate data sets contribute their perspectives and advice on climate data and analysis methods for a broad community of data users. Users may participate by posting comments, questions, and links.” For now, there are only a few datasets going back more than a century, so it has limited use for historians. However, the searchability and clear evaluations of data make it a valuable tool for non-specialists. (The link has been added to the “Databases and Projects” page.)
New Project Links
The website has added links to the Deutsche Wetterdienst, containing extensive German and international climate data from the instrumental period, and to Climates of Migration project, a collaboration of the Rachel Carson Center and the Institute for Advanced Studies at Essen (KWI). Thanks to members for drawing my attention to these sites.
New Facebook Page for CHN
Please visit our new Climate History Network Facebook page at http://www.facebook.com/climatehistorynetwork for more news and links. (And thanks to Dagomar and Eleonora for putting this together!)
New Website: The “Environment and Society Portal”
The Environment and Society Portal is a non-profit education and research project created by the Rachel Carson Center for Environment and Society, jointly initiated by the LMU Munich and the Deutsches Museum. It aims to provide open access to environmental humanities materials and targets an academic audience as well as the interested public. The page architects expressly encourage users’ contributions to the portal “to cultivate the spirit of exploration and serendipity that characterizes research.” For starters, three interactive navigation tools, the map viewer, the timeline tool and the keyword explorer will guide you through “a small but fascinating selection of digital multimedia and interpretive features.” Enjoy!
