Understanding data through multiple dimensions is a critical detail that is consistently overlooked when consuming knowledge for argumentative or explanatory purposes. In my experience before taking Data Cultures this semester, I never questioned the ways in which data can be dissected and further understood. Rather than asking the question of what the data is, it is arguably just as important to answer the question as to why the data is presented. The “why” factor is what leads to greater understanding and analysis. This last week, my class had the opportunity to learn about the ways in which we can present data through multiple mediums, the themes within Jessica Johnson’s “Markup Bodies: Black [Life] Studies and Slavery [Death] Studies at the Digital Crossroads” and Muñoz and Rawson’s “Against Cleaning”. Throughout the last few weeks in class, through a culminating weekly worksheet, we also were able to work with more data to practice using for loops. With our new knowledge, our goal is to be able to present more detail that is not as evident and connect dots that are not in range of our span.
A question that I would like to answer for my final project is figuring out what the political status of contributors is and how the variety of beliefs influence contribution values. I strongly believe in understanding the truth behind this question is essential because it can provide a great deal of information in regards to the way that political beliefs transform into social beliefs. While religious affiliation is just as important, my drive to understand political affiliation primarily stems from the evident divide in current-day politics. Understanding history through a cumulative and data recorded lens can help provide answers to solve the social issues that we see on a day to day basis right now.
The ways in which I would structure the data in a relational database is through providing a scatter plot that clearly presents all of the possible political affiliations present at that time and also seeing the trend over time that expresses the number of contributions made. Although listing out data or political affiliation next to the location of donation on a spreadsheet can present the message I am trying to portray, it is more important to connect with your audience and make sure that the multiple narratives can be even more dissembled from there.
The methods that I plan on using to answer my question are doing an immense amount of research on political affiliations during the time frame that my data was recorded in and also doing greater historical research on the general state of the United States politics. I am currently not sure of what the census fully recorded, but understanding the geographical location of contributors can be enough help in understanding what a typical person in a specific zip code would likely believe in. What is critical to recognize is that without officially recorded data, it is nearly impossible to come to conclusions about what political parties people belonged to. But what is attainable is attempting to find a decent correlation to how the voting was accomplished, who voted for who in specific locations, and how we can connect it back to plotting the data.
To conclude, my mission for answering this question is to analyze the characteristics of political affiliation then and also comparing it to studies completed now. Due to more accessibility to information especially in the social sciences, I think it would be fascinating to see whether or not there are similarities between now and then in regards to contributions.
