The ReACH workshop series is funded by the AHRC Arts and Humanities e-Science Intitiative.



Researching e-Science Analysis of Census Holdings

First Workshop - All Hands Meeting - 14th June 2006


The All Hands Workshop, the first in the series, was held on Wednesday 14th June 2006. It aimed to ascertain how feasible, and indeed, useful utilizing e-Science technologies to analyse historical census data would be. Undertaking e-science analysis of historical census records may be technically possible – but will it be useful to academic researchers?

The workshop brought together a wide range of interdisciplinary expertise to ascertain the academic community’s view of the benefit and concerns in undertaking a full-scale research project utilizing available historical census data and the Research Computing facilities at UCL. Through various presentations and discussions, this workshop explained the technological issues, and explored the historical techniques which may be useful for undertaking research of historical census material in this manner.

Results from this workshop contributed to the discussions held at the Technical and Managerial workshops.


Programme

9.30 Coffee

10.00 Welcome and Introduction – aims of the day
        Introducing ReACH
        Melissa Terras, DIS, University College London

10.45 Research Computing at UCL – An Overview
        Clare Gryce, Research Computing, University College London

11.15 Putting the Census Online: The National Archives’ Perspective
        Ruth Selman, Knowledge and Academic Services Department, The National Archives

12.00 Lunch
  
13.00 Grid Enabling Population Datasets - the ConvertGrid and GEMS projects
        Keith Cole, Census Data Unit, National Dataset Services Group, MIMAS, The University of
        Manchester

13.30 Linking Nineteenth-Century Scottish Records: Procedures and Practicalities
        Ros Davies, Eilidh Garrett and Alice Reid, Cambridge Group for the History of Population and Social Structure

14.00 Coffee

14.30 Ancestry Census Records - Background, Structure, and Format
        Mike Wolfgramm, Vice President of Development, MyFamily

15.00
Discussion Session: e-Science Analysis of Historical Census Records: Feasible or Useful?
        In this discussion session all participants were asked their opinions of the potential research project. Will undertaking this analysis result in any new information of worth for the academic community? What potential pitfalls are their in undertaking this research? What type of results can be generated from the available datasets? Is undertaking a research project in this area worthy of the time and expense it will take to set it up?

16.00 Summary and Conclusion
16.30 Close