Media Archaeology: Basics and Ethics

Dr Olenka Syaivo Dmytryk

Dr Olenka Syaivo Dmytryk received their PhD in Slavonic Studies from the University of Cambridge. Their work focuses on Ukraine and is located at the crossing of social movements studies, the histories and theories of sexuality and gender, and visual culture studies. Their current research aims to better understand the Internet’s role in sustaining or limiting sexual and gender dissent in Ukraine. They are a co-editor of the Feminist Critique: East European Journal of Feminist and Queer Studies journal and collaborate with the Invisible University For Ukraine. They work as a History of Art librarian but prefer doing research at home in the company of a cat called Soya.

Do you find yourself ‘stuck’ in your research or practice because the websites that you need are not working anymore? Perhaps you’ve heard about the Internet Archive and the Wayback machine, but not sure how to use them? Are you worried about the ethics of using archived websites in your research or practice? Or are you a keen enthusiast of web preservation and a fan of the early Internet and web archives?

If any of these apply to you, or you just want to learn and share more on the topic, come and join one of the limited places to discuss the positives and challenges one can encounter when turning to media archaeology. This workshop is aimed at beginners. Together, we will:

• Learn about /share experiences using early Internet platforms or archived websites for research or practice.
• Discuss the ethics of working with the early Internet platforms, the benefits that media archaeology can bring to different communities, as well as its limitations and the dangers.
• Discover strategies for using early Internet platforms in research and processes of anonymising users and minimising resource visibility in the dissemination of research.
• Practice analysing the data gathered using different tools.

This workshop is part of our Methods Fellowship programme, which develops and delivers innovative teaching in digital methods. You can read more about the and view the complete series of workshops here.

Our CDH Methods workshops have limited places and are prioritised for students and staff members at the University of Cambridge. However, if space is available, we welcome all participants who want to learn and apply digital methods and use digital tools in their research. In addition to requesting a ticket, please complete this pre-workshop questionnaire before 4 March 2025, and we'll confirm your place if one is available.

This session may be of particular interest to:

• PhD students in the Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences
• Early Career Researchers in the Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences

This workshop does not assume prior knowledge of machine learning or computer vision models; however, participants are encouraged to read the article by Antonio Somaini for background information on latent spaces, analytical and generative methods.

No software installation is required for this workshop.

If you have specific accessibility needs for this event, please get in touch. We will do our best to accommodate any requests.

Event Venue & Nearby Stays

Cambridge University Library, West Road, Cambridge, United Kingdom