Storified narrative: Awake photo archives in digital humanities

Abstract The rise and development of digital humanities have brought new challenges and possibilities to the archival narrative. This article aims to explore the storified narrative path to awake photo archives in digital humanities. The authors clarify plot and plot unit definitions first, then focus on photo archives to analyze the path realization of the storified narrative. The authors also take the photo archives of Chinese Archivist Mr Wu Baokang, an example for a more specific explanation, which Mrs Wu Jiaqing authorizes. The plot-driven storified narrative path of photo archives involves two parts: story elements deconstruction and plot units representation, narrative clues construction, and plot generation. The plot-driven, storified narrative path can fully play the advantages of storifying and promoting the critical development of archival narrative under the research paradigm of digital humanities. By exploring the storified narrative path of archives, it is helpful to promote the activation, in-depth utilization, and widespread dissemination of archives, promote the integration of archival narrative with digital humanities, and provide support for digital humanities research.