Enhancing encyclopedic characteristics using geotagging: why it matters?

Abstract

Through the last couple of decades, encyclopaedias have transformed significantly, becoming digital and born-digital, full of multimedia, and today among other characteristics being well connected via hypertext and metadata. At the same time, in digital humanities an increasing emphasis is being put on mapping or geotagging archival data, with special emphasis on networking projects and international cooperation. Digital platforms are being designed for publishing, describing, presenting, searching or browsing through historical sources. Some projects take the temporal aspect further, enabling not just retrieving historical data but also offering navigation through space and time via interactive maps. Encyclopaedias joining such initiatives would allow for new ways to explore its content and connecting encyclopaedic knowledge with specific artefacts and locations so users could visit them. Some encyclopaedic projects include a similar approach to their content, but further development is needed. In this paper, authors analyse existing conditions among web-based encyclopaedic projects (such as the Brockhaus Encyclopaedia and the Slovenian biographical lexicon), the data types appropriate for geotagging, opportunities and perspectives. This paper will also explain how using geotagging enhances encyclopaedias' characteristics. This would contribute to further encyclopaedia's interactivity and allow for new ways for users to explore content and learn, in turn contributing to its greater usage.