Creative Uses of Zotero

Posted on March 26, 2014 by Patrick Williams

I’m very interested in how people research, read, and write together, and I”m also an avid user of Zotero. I’m proposing a session where Zotero users (both new & old) talk about ways to use the tool to do more than just collect and manage citations.

This would include strategies for using Zotero in writing and collaboration, approaches to using Zotero in the classroom for projects and for syllabi, practical tips and tricks for reading & note-taking, and ways of visualizing, understanding, and enhancing Zotero libraries. I’d also like to discuss the plugins that extend Zotero and, time permitting, provide a brief introduction to how one may write a Zotero translator to import citations from a source  not currently supported by the tool.

Categories: Collaboration, Session: Talk, Social Media, Teaching |

About Patrick Williams

Librarian for Literature, Rhetoric, and Digital Humanities at Syracuse University. I am the editor of Really System, a journal of poetry and extensible poetics, and lead editor of the dh+lib Review. I received my B.A. in English from The University of North Carolina at Greensboro and an M.S. ('04) and Ph.D. ('11) in Information Studies from the School of Information at The University of Texas at Austin.

5 Responses to Creative Uses of Zotero

  1. Jason Luther says:
    April 1, 2014 at 2:17 am

    I’ve been using Zotero for my own research with the occasional group library sharing, but I’d love to expand my use of it beyond basic reference management. At the same time, I also wonder if what I consider basic, isn’t so (or vice versa). I’d also be interested in hearing how folks are using it in their teaching.

  2. Michelle Paolillo says:
    April 3, 2014 at 7:20 pm

    I am interested in algorithmic analysis of text. I understand that Papermachines can be used as an extension of Zotero to do this, but have not experienced this. Anyone interested in that direction? What little I know is below. Maybe this is a good context for a group exploration.
    – Blog post metalab.harvard.edu/2012/07/paper-machines/
    – Predicated on Zotero – www.zotero.org/ (Which in turn, requires FireFox)
    – Code at github: github.com/chrisjr/papermachines

  3. Patrick Williams says:
    April 7, 2014 at 3:37 pm

    I’ve used Paper Machines a little bit, and it’s interesting, but I think the text analysis tools in the newly proposed session on the topic [http://cny2014.thatcamp.org/2014/04/07/text-analysis-hows-and-whys/] are a bit more robust (and don’t demand that texts come from a Zotero library).

    The good news is that Zotero doesn’t require Firefox anymore, and we can cover that in the session.

  4. Alexander Nakhimovsky says:
    April 8, 2014 at 1:09 pm

    I have never used Zotero, but I’m about to embark on a collaborative project and would like to learn. I’ll do my best not to slow down the discussion.

  5. Patrick Williams says:
    April 8, 2014 at 5:11 pm

    Alexander– I bet we can find time to have an intro to Zotero session as well, but either way, thanks for your interest!

Comments are closed.