It’s hard to believe that the semester is coming to an end, especially when I start to reflect on how much I have learned about digital history. Prior to taking Clio Wired, I thought digital history was just digitizing historical documents and creating websites. Clearly, I had no idea that digital history goes beyond these few attributes!!
As we discussed in our last class, the definitions and attributes of digital history/humanities can keep going on and on. At its most basic level, digital history/humanities can be described as “the intersection of computing and cultural heritage” (Nyhan & Flinn, 1). While Nyhan and Flinn are providing a historical overview of digital history and demonstrating the importance of understanding the history of this historiography, the authors also perfectly characterize the ever-evolving, slightly messy, potential of digital history/humanities (Nyhan & Flinn, 1-15).
Stating that DH, “is Janus-like in scope: it looks back at questions the Humanities have long asked and attempts to ask them in new ways. It also looks forward to identify new questions that could not otherwise be conceived of or explored. In both cases it incorporates new or otherwise specialized and repurposed forms of computing” (Nyhan & Flinn, 5). Digital history/humanities provides humanists with new tools to access or mine the past which in turn generates new questions and answers about the past. This definition not only sums up what the digital humanities is, but it also characterizes what we have learned in Clio Wired this past semester! Already Clio Wired has given me ideas about how I can incorporate digital history tools in my own work. I could use ARCGIS to map the lives of the Myers family, who were a merchant family that traveled all over early America and western Europe. Not only would this be an amazing visualization tool, but it would also tell me a lot about where and why the Myerses were settling in particular places (Nyhan & Flinn, 1-15).
While the messiness of digital humanities makes things more complex and interesting, this ambiguity can also be DH’s downfall. As all the articles for this module allude to, there is a lot of potential, yet also uncertainty, within the digital humanities. To curb this uncertainty, authors Gerben Zaagsma, Julianne Nyhan, and Andrew Flinn discuss the history and historiography of DH within their works (Zaagsma, 451- 481; Nyhan & Flinn, 1-15). Zaagsma’s main point within “Facing the History Machine” is that “To understand what is new in digital history and how past work can inform present debates and practices, we need a self-understanding grounded in history” (451). Similarly stated in Nyhan and Flinn’s Computation and the Humanities, which focuses on exploring the history of DH, “the lack of such a history is hindering DH’s understanding of itself and what it is that truly makes it distinctive” (14). “Facing the History Machine” and Computation and the Humanities tackle the messiness of DH by taking readers back to the beginning of the field, as Zaagsma, Nyhan, and Flinn argue that this is the most effective way for the digital humanities to come to understand and define itself (Zaagsma, 451- 481; Nyhan & Flinn, 1-15).
As mentioned, the other articles discussed in this module also confront DH’s ambiguity. Roopika Risam’s “Beyond the Margins” advocates for the digital humanities to embrace more diverse projects and perspectives within DH. Stating that “The fluidity of intersectionality is a natural fit for the flexibility that digital humanities connotes” as Risam turns DH’s ambiguity into a potential good as it can generate diverse and unlimited possibilities (like we discussed at the beginning of the semester!) (Risam, https://dhq.digitalhumanities.org/vol/9/2/000208/000208.html).
The article “The Push and Pull of Digital Humanities” describes the downside of DH’s ambiguity as “With definitions that ranged from advice on learning to code to documents that defined the field according to utopian values like ‘openness,’ the topic model did represent quite a range of ways the field is defined and encapsulated topics that covered both the push and the pull of digital humanities.” (https://dhq.digitalhumanities.org/vol/14/1/000450/000450.html).
The feeling of being lost is echoed in the article “Student Labour and Training in Digital Humanities” as this piece describes how student workers navigate the many definitions of, the academic hierarchies within, and students’ overall roles within the digital humanities. (https://dhq.digitalhumanities.org/vol/10/1/000233/000233.html).
Considering the amount of discourse generated from the lack of as well as excess of definitions for DH, it is hard to come to a conclusion on what exactly are the digital humanities. Yet Hansson’s short article offers a simple way to look at DH. By viewing the digital humanities as topic-defined and with a methodological criteria, I believe this allows for clear, but many, definitions of DH that can counteract a variety of confusion, while ultimately leaving wiggle room for the controlled messiness that is characteristic of the digital humanities, as discussed in the articles above (Hansson, 273-275; Zaagsma, 451- 481; Nyhan & Flinn, 1-15; https://dhq.digitalhumanities.org/vol/9/2/000208/000208.html; https://dhq.digitalhumanities.org/vol/14/1/000450/000450.html; https://dhq.digitalhumanities.org/vol/10/1/000233/000233.html).
Excellent post Ally! I appreciated your exploration of the messiness and ambiguity around digital humanities. It was especially interesting because you expanded beyond just the lack of a clear definition but also discussed the confusion within academic hierarchies and how students and student workers have to awkwardly navigate that environment. I was also really interested in your ideas about applying DH and mapping to your own research. If you decide to take that on I would love to read/see it!
Howdy Ally,
Nice post! I liked your coverage of DH’s nebulous and messy nature; it was something I covered in my blog as well. I found myself disagreeing slightly with Nyhan and Flynn when they said that DH has a lack of “history,” and that is what hinders it so much. They are certainly right to an extent, but I also couldn’t help myself from imagining that the sheer size and (to repeat myself) messiness of DH also plays a role. That’s not to say that the mass-accessibility is a negative thing, but more in line with what Callaway’s article says: that the proliferation of definitions can “lead to a sense of whiplash for those interested in entering the field,” (20).
Like Chappy, I would be very interested in seeing what you decide to do if you incorporate DH and mapping into your research!
Excellent post Ally! I appreciate your description of your own personal journal related to thinking about digital history. I also appreciate the summary you provide of the “messiness” related to practices and definitions. I think “messiness” is an interesting term to use since I almost always use it related to physical and not digital space (as in “the room was messy”). Of course, a file system can be messy, a Web site might be messy etc. On the whole, very interesting!
Ally, I am intrigued by your idea about using the ARCGIS tool to map the migration of the Myers family. I believe practical applications of tools we learned in this class is a great way to conduct historical research, present the output in more accessible and exciting forms and at the same time accumulate some marketable skills. I wonder how you would integrate this project in your GMU studies. I am not sure which courses, besides the Directed Studies or the Thesis allow us the necessary flexibility to accomplish what you want to. In any case, I intend to keep an eye out for projects like yours going forward. Best wishes.
Hi Ally, great post! I really liked how you highlighted how the “messiness” of DH can increase its ambiguity, where a positive aspect of DH can at times have a negative impact. I was also relatively unfamiliar most of the DH realm, and it had been fascinating to learn different tools that I could use in my future work, as you mentioned about using mapping for your work on the Myers family. The idea of many definitions is interesting, and I think it is more viable than trying to come up with an overarching definition of DH. Best of luck with the rest of your semester!
Hi Ally! This is great post and I think we share a similar outlook when reflecting on the semester. Almost as though we know we covered a lot of material and learned a lot about DH, but what DH is remains unclear and undefined. I think it is possible that a secret silver lining exists in the ambiguity of DH and digital history. Unfortunately, this does not make it easier to approach.