Detecting Orientalism in Sherlock Holmes


Data

In addition to the graphic data we produced from our XML markup of The Sign of the Four, we added a checkbox to the text page. The checkbox was hard coded into the xhtml page and our group leader wrote a Java script to enable the check boxes to interact with the text. The checkbox allows the user to interact with the text by seeing the types of descriptors used by either Sherlock or Watson. The user can click on a character (or both) and then choose a part of speech to look at with the text. This gives the user the opportunity to see the words in context to get a picture of how orientalism was described in the text by the two main characters. We hope this feature adds to the user's experience with our site and our research question.

Primitive Violent Exotic Undetermined S W S W S W S W 5 10 15 20 25

This graph visualizes language used by Sherlock Holmes (S) and Dr. John Watson (W) throughout this text. It represents the positive, ambiguous, and negative attitudes towards Eastern objects and people. We categorized these objects and people as being either primitive, violent, exotic, or an undetermined type to represent how the most important Western characters in this work discussed things pertaining to the East.

In the chart, positive is represented by green, ambiguous is represented by yellow, and negative is represented by blue.

2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 West Red = Positive Orange = Ambiguous Yellow= Negative East Green = Positive Blue = Ambiguous Violet = Negative CH 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 West Red = Positive Orange = Ambiguous Yellow= Negative East Green = Positive Blue = Ambiguous Violet = Negative CH 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 West Red = Positive Orange = Ambiguous Yellow= Negative East Green = Positive Blue = Ambiguous Violet = Negative CH 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 West Red = Positive Orange = Ambiguous Yellow= Negative East Green = Positive Blue = Ambiguous Violet = Negative CH 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 West Red = Positive Orange = Ambiguous Yellow= Negative East Green = Positive Blue = Ambiguous Violet = Negative CH 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 West Red = Positive Orange = Ambiguous Yellow= Negative East Green = Positive Blue = Ambiguous Violet = Negative CH 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 West Red = Positive Orange = Ambiguous Yellow= Negative East Green = Positive Blue = Ambiguous Violet = Negative CH 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 West Red = Positive Orange = Ambiguous Yellow= Negative East Green = Positive Blue = Ambiguous Violet = Negative CH 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 West Red = Positive Orange = Ambiguous Yellow= Negative East Green = Positive Blue = Ambiguous Violet = Negative CH 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 West Red = Positive Orange = Ambiguous Yellow= Negative East Green = Positive Blue = Ambiguous Violet = Negative CH 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 West Red = Positive Orange = Ambiguous Yellow= Negative East Green = Positive Blue = Ambiguous Violet = Negative CH 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 West Red = Positive Orange = Ambiguous Yellow= Negative East Green = Positive Blue = Ambiguous Violet = Negative CH 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40

This graph visualizes the language in each chapter used to described either Eastern or Western objects or people and the positive, ambiguous, or negative attitudes assigned to them.

In this graph, the West is represented by the stacks of red, orange, and yellow bars, while the East is represented by the stacks of green, blue, and violet bars.