Understanding patterns of engagement in the citizen humanities: The civil records of Suriname

Abstract

This study aims to identify engagement profiles in the citizen humanities and assess whether these profiles match those found in prior studies on crowd-based projects in the natural sciences. To this purpose, we use the log data from the citizen humanities project ‘Historical Database Suriname and the Caribbean’, in which volunteers transcribe the civil records of Suriname, and analyze the differences between engagement in data entry and forum activity. We identify seven engagement profiles, six of which are similar to the profiles found in crowd projects in the natural sciences. However, their pattern of occurrence differs with a more equal distribution of effort. Additionally, we discuss implications for project design and recommend choices that match project goals and foster engagement diversity.