Digital Humanities

Sketching the DH Spectrum

¶ 1 Leave a comment on paragraph 1 1 If we imagine DH as a spectrum, there are certainly a few categories that would stand out, and we see these categories present themselves again and again, often implicit, in the definition arguments of various digital humanists. Let’s try and sketch them out:

0. ¶ 2 Leave a comment on paragraph 2 1
1. Builders/Programmers: In this area of DH, the focus is on constructing digital tools such as web-publishing platforms, data analysis tools, data visualization/graphing, and collaboration tools. We might imagine this as the “hard” DH, where extensive training in programming would be required. More than just learning how to use digital tools, this sub-field would demand knowledge and experience in actually building digital tools from scratch. This is the area the computer scientist would be most at-home, though ideally, that computer scientist would be knowledgeable of traditional methods of textual analysis so there’s some comprehension of how digital tools would work in relation to what has come before. This is the area Stephen Ramsay would hold in high regard. These DHers are the engineers who build the sandbox for other DHers to play in.
2. Experimenters/Practitioners: This category features those DHers that put digital tools to work in examining texts. Rather than build the tools, these are the people who are running texts through text-mining programs and re-arranging texts in digital formats. These are the people who are playing in the proverbial sandbox. Working in this area would require knowledge and experience in a wide array of digital tools, and some programming knowledge would be quite useful, but not necessarily required. Putting these digital tools into practice would demand less technical and more methodological knowledge, though these clearly overlap. We might fit Melissa Terras and Kathleen Fitzpatrick in this category.
3. Sharers/Ambassadors: This category of DH is relatively meta, with a focus less on implementing DH tools in a “hard” sense than on encouraging the use of “light” tools, such as open-source peer-review software or some of the more powerful WordPress features. These DHers are interested in extending the use of DH tools to a wider audience because they appreciate the sheer utility of these tools. This category of DH work would not demand any kind of serious programming or “building” knowledge, but a working understanding of basic online tools and experience in learning and applying new tools. Mark Sample feels like he might belong here.
4. Theorists/Thinkers: These digital humanists explore the ways in which working with texts using digital tools impacts the way we think about those texts, and those tools. This area of DH would emphasize a certain level of metacognition, an urge to step back and critique DH methodology and approaches. Many more “traditional” humanists and critical theorists would be comfortable in this DH category, exploring the larger assumptions and ideological structures of DH. Jerome McGann could work in this area.

¶ 3 Leave a comment on paragraph 3 1 Each of these areas is important and fits easily under the DH umbrella. Really, most DH scholars would be some combination of these categories. It would be rare or very nearly impossible to find a scholar who exists solely in one of these categories. We can think of these areas or categories more as tendencies or concentrations, where experience and aptitude in other areas would be important, but it makes sense for someone to have a focused interest in only one or two areas. As an overall field, DH would benefit and grow from work in all of these areas, and would perhaps be enriched most by those who can move easily from one area to another.

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