Digital Humanities

9/12: McGann Blog Prompt

¶ 1 Leave a comment on paragraph 1 0 In his essay “Information Technology and the Troubled Humanities,” Jerome McGann summarizes what it means to be a humanist with the help of a famous quotation from the poet Charles Swinburne. “Glory to man in the highest, for man is the master of things,” is Swinburne’s contention (qtd. 62). McGann extrapolates from this, arguing that “Drawing that distinction — between things and people, between mastery and learning — is what it means to be … a humanist” (62).

¶ 2 Leave a comment on paragraph 2 0 Here, McGann is referring to the relationship between man (subject) and the tools or things (objects) that form the basis of humanist inquiry. How does this image of the humanist bear upon our discussions of the digital humanities? What ought to be the relationship, according to McGann, between humanists as people and the humanities as a collection of methods, tools, or objects of study? Or, to put it another way, what does this discussion about subjects and objects have to do with McGann’s arguments about the future of the humanities, and the future of the digital tools that we, as humanists, use?

This entry is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any comments on this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a comment, or trackback from your own site.