Project StoryMachine: exploring implications of recommender based spatial hypertext systems for folklore and the humanities

Project StoryMachine aims to preserve, explore and provide greater access to folklore traditions in Germany and the UK, through the development of a digital infrastructure called StoryMachine. Folklore is a crucial element in identity construction and cultural understanding, but it faces archival and cultural challenges, particularly in an era of alternative truths and populist separatism. Traditional digital interventions have focused on archiving and digitising rather than on exploration and analysis. Consequently, they are often concerned with discrete collections rather than wider folkloric traditions, lack interactivity and are not designed to capture emerging folklore and folk experience. StoryMachine addresses these issues, combining spatial hypertext and recommender systems to create a dynamic platform for deep-linking folkloristic narratives. Familiar from commercial contexts like Amazon or Netflix, this use of recommender systems creates exciting, dynamic opportunities for information studies and our approach to archives in general, while spatial hypertext allows this emerging context to be visually and dynamically represented. The proposed research will generate new insights into the relationships between folklore and identity construction by investigating joint motifs, key differences, and commonalities in storytelling among participants from different geographic regions, cultural backgrounds and age groups. The integration of the Aarne-Thompson-Uther Index (a catalogue of folktale types widely used in folklore studies) with the StoryMachine system will enable new approaches to the exploration of folklore. Following the integration of this folklore index with StoryMachine, the investigators will explore and augment folklore motifs by: investigating collaborative digital methods; critically assessing motif analysis; evaluating community engagement in digital storytelling; considering the psychological aspects of interacting with such systems; and demonstrating StoryMachine's potential for reimagining information culture. The innovative user interface of StoryMachine facilitates collaboration between users and the machine, offering a unique middle ground that empowers users and leverages the co-creative potential of machine intelligence. The tools and methods developed for and deployed in this project will have impact beyond folklore studies, extending to storytelling and narrative development more widely, offering opportunities for diverse audiences, including scholars, students, educators and wider interested publics. The research addresses fundamental questions about authorship and ownership in generative AI, providing a collaborative approach that emphasises human-machine equality and is more context-sensitive and emergent than existing LLM-oriented approaches. The impact of StoryMachine will be considered in terms of its potential applications in various fields and its ability to reshape knowledge cultures and communities. The project brings together scholars from five distinct but interconnected disciplines: folklore studies, digital humanities, narrative studies, psychology and computer science. The collaboration aims to strengthen academic research in folklore between the UK and Germany, in addition to creating new perspectives within and across disciplines. StoryMachine advances digital humanities, hypertext and narrative studies by offering a tool that innovates approaches to exploration, creativity, and collaboration in folklore studies and beyond.