It’s hard to believe that we’re at the end of the Digital Scholarship Summer Research Fellows program. 8 weeks ago I was on a 13-hour flight from Beijing to JFK, and between the naps and the meals and way too many movies, I started thinking about possible directions I can take my research in the weeks to come. The changes that I had seen in China in my short time back reminded me of the numerous trips I made back there since migrating to Singapore when I was four. Each time I visited, there were significant changes I noticed and in recent years Internet use in China seems to be booming and seeping into every aspect of people’s lives. Wanting to learn more about the recent Internet developments within the country and their significance in the context of China, I decided to make this the focus of my project this summer. Now 8 weeks later, I’m excited to share with you the site that this initial idea led me to create: http://bucknell.maps.arcgis.com/apps/Cascade/index.html?appid=c082a479d04c440a8d1f140df9bf69e4

It is incredible how digital scholarship projects can be tailored to so many different fields. Tyler, Justin, Rennie and I all came in with research topics that were vastly different and the tools that we needed to complete our projects also varied greatly. From Voyant to Tableau, each week we were introduced to digital tools that I had never heard of. While I ended up only using ESRI StoryMaps and TimelineJS, the exposure to the myriad of tools out there is extremely valuable and I can see them being applied in so many ways beyond my summer project. This summer also confirmed my interest in Economics. The process of researching my topic has been very enjoyable and I am eager to delve deeper into this area of study.  I also hope to have the opportunity to work with the Economics and East Asian Studies department in the future to build upon what I have created this summer.

The past 8 weeks have opened my eyes to the vast amount of resources students have access to on campus. There are so many academic journals and articles we have at our fingertips, and the librarians have been incredibly helpful in the process of navigating through these sites and huge amounts of information. This summer has also shown me the value of collaboration and the sharing of ideas. Our trips to Bryn Mawr and Gettysburg were especially helpful in giving us a glimpse of what students from other colleges are working on and also exchange ideas and propose changes that can better our individual projects.

A big thank you to Carrie and Courtney for introducing us to the world of Digital Scholarship this summer, and for giving us so much help and support over the past 8 weeks. I also want to thank Justin, Rennie and Tyler for their suggestions and input that contributed greatly to my final project. The conversations ranging from “is dead a state” to trouser choices have been fun.