Software tools like Voyant, kepler.gl, and Palladio can be used to create visual rerepresentations of research findings. The tools expand on existing computational methods and techniques. These existing computational methods include textmining, mapping and network analysis. Amongst other similarities, Voyant, kepler.gl, and Palladio can be used to demonstrate the relationships that exists within the research data. Users can upload their digitized research data into the given software to create visualizations of the data. The visualizations will then enable the data to be interpreted and analyzed. However, software tools vary in how they can visually enhance information and what digitization techniques can be used collaboratively.
Voyant is preferred when textmining data. Voyant enables users to upload links of textual information into data sets to be processed into a digital corpus. The digital corpus can then be modified into Voyant’s visual interactive tools like Cirrus, Reader, Trends, Summary and Contexts. For example, I filtered data from the WPA slave narratives to compare the frequency of words in various states. I was then able to conduct a textual analysis of distinctive words based on location. From these tools, users can conduct data analysis to determine relevant patterns and relationships.
Comparatively, kepler.gl is a digitized mapping tool. Users can utilize features like points, clusters and heat maps to enhance uploaded data. The assortment of maps enable the exploration of data point density to illuminate the significance of certain locations. Kepler.gl also offers features like category maps and timelines to demonstrate the changes and continuities that exist over time in a data set. Kepler.gl also enables data differentiation. I was able to use kepler.gl to differentiate the different jobs the enslaved (identified in the WPA slave narratives) were assigned. I was also able to use the timeline feature to see changes in the data overtime to examine the relationships between various locations and their significance in Alabama.
Palladio, a digital network graphing tool, can also be used to create visual interactives. Users can upload data that can be networked within the software. Palladio allows its users to modify the dimensions, layers, sources, targets, facets, nodes and links of uploaded data. With these modifications, users can evaluate the patterns and connections that exist in the data. In my usage of the WPA slave narratives, I was able to identify patterns in the data related to unknown ages of the interviewees by using the provided dimensions.
Clearly, all three software tools are useful in showing the relationships and patterns that exist in uploaded data. But, they differ in what computational methods they can be best utilized. Voyant is preferred for textmining while kepler.gl and Palladio are useful for data mapping. Despite the differences, these three software tools can be used in collaboration to provide various visual interactives that can be used to confirm or deny patterns and continuities in the data. The given software can also be used to draw support for historical interpretations by drawing on the quantitative and qualitative evidence presented in textmining and mapping.