Using the Digital Archive in

a Research ContextOpportunities and Challenges of Participatory Digital

Archives: Lessons from the March 11, 2011 Great Eastern Japan Disaster

Harvard UniversityJanuary 24-25, 2013

Keiko Nishimura Galbraith

I am...

•A researcher studying digital media and communication

•Assisting a professor who is working on social issues in contemporary Japan

•An individual who experienced 3/11

As a Researcher

Papers• “Social Media in Disaster Japan,” in Jeff

Kingston ed. Natural Disaster and Nuclear Crisis in Japan: Response and Recovery after Japan’s 3/11. London: Routledge. April 7, 2012. (Co-authored with David H. Slater and Love Kindstrand.)

•“Social Media, Information, and Political Activism in Japan's 3.11 Crisis,” The Asia-Pacific Journal, Vol 10, Issue 24, No 1. June 11, 2012. (Co-authored with David H. Slater and Love Kindstrand.) [http://www.japanfocus.org/-Nishimura-Keiko/3762]

April 2012

Text

June 11, 2012

Teaching 311

http://icc.fla.sophia.ac.jp/html/events/2012-2013/Teaching_3.11.html

Social Media and 3/11

Text

Outline•Phase 1: First responses

•Cross-platform dissemination

•Phase 2: Consolidation and use of information

•Rallying support

•Negative effects

•Phase 3: Politicization of/by social media

•Emerging alternative publics through protest

•The extension of the digital sphere

April 2012

Outline•Phase 1: First responses

•Cross-platform dissemination

•Phase 2: Consolidation and use of information

•Rallying support

•Negative effects

•Phase 3: Politicization of/by social media

•Emerging alternative publics through protest

•The extension of the digital sphere

Outline•Phase 1: First responses

•Cross-platform dissemination

•Phase 2: Consolidation and use of information

•Rallying support

•Negative effects

•Phase 3: Politicization of/by social media

•Emerging alternative publics through protest

•The extension of the digital sphere

Gathering Data•Primary data

•Tweets, posted pictures, blog articles, BBS entries, and matome (summary) sites

•Secondary data

•Government announcements, white papers, company reports and analyses, newspaper articles, etc

Objective

•Phase 1: First responses

•Macro view

•Reconstructing “what happened”

•Timeline

•Posts, pictures, stories

Tweets

•How people on Twitter experienced the moment of the earthquake

•Google Realtime Search (~July 2, 2011)

•Topsy (http://topsy.com)

•JD archive

3/10 10:20AM

3/10 5:08PM

3/10 8:21PM

3/10 6:02PM

3/11 7:44 AM

Ishimaki, Miyagi

Ogasawara Islands, Tokyo

Tsugaru, Aomori

Osaka

Kyoto

Shibuya, Tokyo

Sendai, Miyagi

Biwako lake, Shiga

Fukushima

Ishimaki, Miyagi

Ogasawara Islands, Tokyo

Tsugaru, Aomori

Osaka

Kyoto

Shibuya, Tokyo

Sendai, Miyagi

Biwako lake, Shiga

Fukushima

An intensity 6 earthquake hit and my TV fell, but I’m going to bed because I’m

sleepy. This is nothing for us Sendai people – we are used to earthquakes. But I’ll take pictures of the disaster before that. I think several houses might have fallen down. I

hear screaming from outside. Still shaking.

Findings•Timeline right before and after 3/11/11

14:47 without keyword

•Early warning signs in smaller earthquakes (from the day before), automated earthquake monitoring program notified its followers

•Broader areas (Kyoto, Ogasawara Islands, Biwako Lake, etc) were hit by earthquakes, ranging in intensity

•Tweets were in multiple languages, at least Japanese, English and Chinese

Social Media and 3/11

Limitation of Social Media

•Social media did not reach those in need in disaster stricken areas

•Tohoku region home to many aging people

•The rate of use of mobile phones among those over 70 years of age is around 30%

•Archive illustrates one of the main points of our paper: limitation of social media

ツイッター /Twitter

Findings

•Location information with map and layers becomes intuitive information

•Citable to papers with screen shot

As a Research Assistant

Objective

•Theme: 3/11 and its aftermath

•Social issues (poverty, labor, welfare, social withdrawal, “lonely death,” etc)

Keyword search

•depression, lonely death, employment, etc

•Web sites - newspaper/magazine articles, blog entries, reports from NPO/NGO

•Searching through JD archive - all 3/11 related

Lonely Death

Depression

Employment

Findings

•Primary data

•No newspaper/magazine articles, but blogs and reports by NPO/NGO groups

•Topic-specific searches may not return many results

•Choosing keywords

Potential Expansion?

•Government information (white papers, reports, legislation, etc)

•Party policies (might be a good source for voters confused about the issues)

•Company reports, analyses, press releases

•Academic papers and citations

Future project

Digitality and Materiality of remembering

Scientific knowledge as

affective assessment

Questions

•How should information be treated?

•False rumors; still a record (useful to gauge everyday experience)

•Harmful/discriminatory posts/comments

•Online discussion and debates (Togetter, blog posts)?

Thank you!kaymegu@gmail.com