NEH grant to enhance Booksnake app for immersive archival research

A $150,000 National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) grant has been awarded to a team led by Sean Fraga, assistant professor (teaching) of environmental studies and history at the USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences; Curtis Fletcher, director of the Ahmanson Lab at USC Libraries; and Peter Mancall, Distinguished Professor, Andrew W. Mellon Professor of the Humanities, Linda and Harlan Martens Director of the USC-Huntington Early Modern Studies Institute, and professor of history, anthropology, and economics at USC Dornsife.

The grant will support the development of new features for Booksnake, a mobile augmented reality app that allows users to view digitized archival materials from the Library of Congress on their mobile devices, appearing as if physically present. The app enhances humanities research and teaching by enabling detailed examination of manuscripts, maps and other historical documents.

Specifically, the grant will make it possible for Booksnake users to compare multiple digitized items in physical space simultaneously, and will bring digitized materials from three additional archives–the USC Digital Library, the Huntington Digital Library, and the David Rumsey Map Collection–into Booksnake.

Fraga was invited to demonstrate Booksnake at a Capitol Hill technology fair on Feb. 11, hosted by the NEH to showcase projects that have advanced humanities work using innovative technologies and scientific methods.

Founded in 1965, the NEH is an independent federal agency that funds research and learning in history, literature, philosophy and other areas of the humanities through competitive, peer-reviewed grants.