Who’s the real tool?
¶ 1 Leave a comment on paragraph 1 1 Golumbia’s essay almost feels like a conspiracy theory. This becomes apparent when he starts talking about Hirsch’s writing and the influence it has had, “conservative commentators nonetheless have converged on the view that readers shouldn’t interpret and evaluate texts for themselves, especially with regard to politics” (Golumbia 6). Golumbia uses Hirsch’s constraining of the focus on textual evaluation as ammunition to claim that Digital Humanities is “anti-interpretive” (golumbia 6). He drops this bomb without citing any evidence to back up his claims. Golumbia also brings up a five-year hold quote from Alan Liu complaining that Digital Humanities doesn’t do much to critique it’s own field (Golumbia 20). Dredging up a five-year-old comment makes it fell like he’s struggling to find current problems with Digital Humanities and has to dig up old dirt.
¶ 2 Leave a comment on paragraph 2 2 I think Kirschenbaum did an excellent job refuting much of Columbia’s essay. He managed to accomplish this by publishing a personal essay the highlights his career and some of his education and professional choices. This is a response the dark Golumbia used in his essay, which made Digital Humanities out to be a cabal-like organization trying to steal the humanities as he knows them from his grasp. It’s much easier to hate or dislike someone you don’t know, but by telling his personal story, it makes it much harder to believe that he and people like him are some nefarious group out to change the humanities to serve their corporate masters. One of the charges has being leveled at Digital Humanists is their belief that programming languages should count as credit towards foreign language requirements. At least in Ksdf case he had a practical explanation why he used Perl as a foreign language credit. “ Yes, I “used” Perl for one of the two foreign language reading requirements, an ad hoc request granted by Eric Lott, then DGS. The motive was pure practicality: I knew Perl and had the requirement to fulfill” (Kirschenbaum 5). We see that he wasn’t trying to change any system, Kirschenbaum just figured why not try to get credit for knowing Perl. Although he never said it, I’m sure he would’ve take another foreign language if his request was denied.
¶ 3 Leave a comment on paragraph 3 1 I feel as though Golumbia’s take on the Digital Humanities is highly inaccurate. He has some legitimate complains but they get lost in his rhetoric. He blames so many thing things for the rise of Digital Humanities and what he feels is the lack of focus on literary study that it is hard to think of him other than a conspiracy theorist. I realize that he’s probably not one, but when you blame so many people and organizations it’s tough to shake that feeling. I’ll admit that perhaps I am way off base. I’m not a student of the Humanities department, so I may be missing a lot.
Remember what I said about not making claims about Golumbia, per se?
After all, Golumbia himself is not the author here; rather, Daniel Allington, Sarah Brouillete, and David Golumbia are all the authors here.
You need to clarify the claims that you’re making with regards to the text and you need to take into account the fact that this essay is not Golumbia’s but, rather, a collaborative effort between three different authors.