Theorizing the Vault
Obsidian.md Word Salad
Over the past few weeks, I have been reflecting on how I want to proceed with my writing about Obsidian.md. Indeed, I am again restructuring my entire Vault into this so-called pseudo-database manager (DBM) that I’ve mentioned. However, before we discuss how I am setting up the DBM, I want to problematize Obsidian as a digital archaeological tool for coin analysis. This line of inquiry stems from comments that have stuck with me from a discord server about Obsidian in which a member became irritated about my line of questioning on Obsidian.md as a database manager (DBM). An individual had labelled me as “dumb” and said that Obsidian was not a DBM, nor could it be, given its limited ability to process large quantities of data. Another individual claimed I should listen to them as they were the experts because of their coding/programming background and experience with Obsidian. Yet these individuals did not ask about my background, nor were they curious about my research. So much for open collaboration and theorizing what Obsidian could be.
Now, my feelings were not hurt. Instead, I clapped back at them, defending my position and noting that immature name-calling is childish, lacks intellectual integrity and creates an environment of elitism and exceptionalism. Oh, social media! Indeed, one individual provided some advice. However, the dialogue, if you can call it that, was fruitful as it made me consider ‘What is data?’ and ‘What is a database?’ I’ve begun considering Obsidian on a digital archaeological level from this query. Suppose I will continue using this program for my dissertation research and various other projects. In that case, I need to begin asking, ‘What is Obsidian.md from a digital archaeological perspective?’ The following post is more of a word salad of thoughts that need to be placed into an echo chamber that is everything but. I will stress again, this is a word salad. However, my hope is to inspire a comment (or two) on the philosophical underpinnings of Obsidian not as a digital archaeological tool but rather as a digital archaeology performance—the creation of digital archaeological material culture. So, strap in, as I have no idea where this line of questioning will lead. But first, what is a Vault/Folder in Obsidian.md?
In my initial post about Obsidian.md I described a vault as “a folder stored on your computer. And within that folder, you have sub-folders, and sub-folders, and more sub-folders…” However, I feel I need to expand on this a bit more, as the Vault is not just a simple folder stored on your computer/cloud/server or as the Obsidian.md site states: “A vault is a folder on your file system which contains your notes, [attachments] and the [configuration folder] with Obsidian-specific settings.
In this context, a vault is a parent folder; inside it, there can be an almost infinite number of child folders where files, attachments, media, and anything you can think of can be stored. All these notes/files are stored as markdown text. It is a plain text that can be read by any computer and is future-proof. No matter what Apple, Microsoft, or any other computer company throws at us, the plain text/markdown can be read. But why make a big deal out of the Vault? It’s a simple folder, right? No. Conceptually, it is more complex.
Obsidian is a digital archaeological record. In this post, I broadly define archaeology/the archaeological as the study of material culture created or produced by human intervention, which can be studied to understand human behaviour within a multitude of contexts: analog and digital. However, many would probably assume archaeology is digging in the dirt and excavating, uncovering the past. This is an outdated view of archaeology. Hugh Jeffrey (2023) noted archaeology is a record being created, not uncovered. And for our purpose, it is a digital context that we actively negotiate with. Furthermore, Jeffrey, in his short but impactful chapter Byzantine Archaeology: Teaching the Tenth and the Twentieth Centuries, observes that:
“The term’ archaeological record’ can be vague and confusing. Sometimes it is taken to denote pristine traces of past human activity prior to their encounter with the archaeologist. The record is supposedly finite, but dividing lines between artifact and environment, or past and present, tend to dissolve on close inspection. If an archaeological record exists prior to the discipline of archaeology, it is essentially just another (obfuscating and mystifying) way of saying the world/cosmos/everything” (Jeffrey 2023:54).
There is much to unpack here, but let’s focus on the idea of human activity. If we consider Obsidian/Vault as a digital archaeological record being created, a representation of human thought (activity) manifested through digital context containing digital knowledge and visualized via digital means, we need to consider the intent behind creating an Obsidian vault. If archaeology is the study of human activity via material culture (anything created by human beings, including digital materials), then the Vault is a digital archaeological context. But digital automatically presumes intentionality and, by extension, positionality. This implies that we, as archaeologists, historians, and digital humanists, have a responsibility to consider our positions of privilege and power in creating knowledge as we place and embed agency into the creation of an archaeological record—an agency guided by political, ethical, cultural and social influences. “The archaeological record was created by specific agents, at particular times, with definite objectives” (Jeffrey 2023: 54). The choice of land/site to excavate within a landscape is loaded with agency and objectives, so too is Obsidian.md a choice and can be considered a digital archaeological site; one chosen form many possible candidates. We choose to excavate and create knowledge within the digital landscape for a specific objective, i.e. a DBM for medieval coin analysis.
Thus, I am actively creating a digital archaeological context to create knowledge and to make links and connections, not uncover them. The Vault supports your active negotiation in the note-making process by facilitating visualization by connecting ideas, thoughts, and concepts. Jeffrey notes, “The history of archaeology is a history primarily of creation, not reception. It is both more honest and more useful to consider the archaeological record as something constructed by archaeologists, discursively and materially” (54). The Vault is a constructed digital visualization that supports the creation of a digital archaeological record. It has intentionality. It is causal and exists through your creational intent and objectives. Therefore, there is a philosophical/theoretical approach to creating a Vault for academic or personal research purposes. Academically speaking, you need to critically assess why you are creating your Vault. What is this technology, and what is its purpose? Who programmed it? What are the inherent biases baked into the program? Can I even make objective observations?
Pheww. That was a word salad. If you made it this far, bravo! Let’s wrap this up for now, and I will explore the above through a post-colonial lens in a future post. As with all archaeology in Canada, digital archaeology must reconcile with colonialism, specifically when we import ancient material culture from the eastern Mediterranean to North America. Digital archaeological knowledge creation is no exception, as significant consequences stem from our digital actions. To conclude, if I consider the above when considering Obsidian as an archaeological database manager, I need to consider the Vault as a digital archaeological site of creation that supports my workflow/research development and not just as a note storage machine.