GLAM/Newsletter/January 2021/Contents/UK report
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Protests & Suffragettes - Wikipedia work in 2020; Khalili Collections
Protests & Suffragettes - Wikipedia work in 2020
During 2020 the Protests and Suffragettes project team continued our work as knowledge activists, adding information on Scottish women's activism to Wikipedia and Wikimedia Commons. Despite the COVID-19 pandemic and changing global landscape, we hosted three successful Wikipedia Workshops for beginners and continuing editors online using Zoom (between June - September). In our workshops, we were well supported by Dr Sara Thomas, Scotland Programme Coordinator, Wikimedia UK.
We continue to learn how best to facilitate online meetings as technology advances and improves, for example by using breakout rooms. We have also worked to increase engagement and retain new editors. In particular, we have found by explaining simple discrete tasks (like adding Info Boxes, categories, and wikilinks) that new editors can learn and implement during the relatively short time available in a workshop session, attendees left with both a feeling of accomplishment and a skill they could (and did continue to) apply outwith the original session. We have also worked to organise our project's archival research and share it during these sessions, so that workshop attendees can choose from a list of articles to improve for which references are already available.
Beyond our Wikipedia Workshops, the Protests and Suffragettes team has added numerous images to the commons, including several of our original artworks (modified to be used as 'We Can Edit' video conference backgrounds) and newly recovered images of female activists for use with particular articles. Members of the team have also written, updated, and improved a wide selection of articles.
Khalili Collections
Work in the Khalili Collections project has continued on drafts of concepts relating to the Hajj and to the Khalili Collection of Islamic Art. The Khalili Collection of Aramaic Documents article was included on the English Wikipedia front page on 12 January as a Did You Know. Some volunteers on the Persian Wikipedia have been translating Khalili-related articles, summarising six of the collections so far, including an extensive translation for Khalili Collection of Kimono. Another volunteer translated a few paragraphs of Khalili Collection of Aramaic Documents into French. Martin has been copying image captions from the French, Persian, Vietnamese and Malay uses of images into their Commons pages. In summary, the project has so far created 21 new articles (11 by Martin, 10 by volunteers) with a further 5 new articles in draft.
