What Makes a Digital Humanist?

I wish to add to Stephen Ramsay’s “Who’s In and Who’s Out” – partially because I love a controversial topic, and partially because these topics seem to be a great sieve, worthy of discussing not for their inherent truth but because of their role in solidifying opinions and clarifying necessary definitions.

In Franco Moretti’s “Graphs”, he uses data collection to map the history, popularity, and interruptions of the novel as a form. I was surprised by the clarity of his writing in “Graphs” compared to “Maps” which likely helped the concept resonate with me. I want to expound on one aspect of his text which seemed to be a theme for in his presentation of every graph.

Moretti, while demonstrating skills in graphing, focuses on interpretation. But not just interpretation – he details the necessity and fallibility of assigning meaning to data. In doing so, he carves out one aspect of a Digital Humanist, namely, the ability assign meaning to data with historical evidence and informed hypotheses.

Digital skills aren’t enough, though they’re certainly part of it. As Stephen Ramsay puts it, this is the creation aspect (more decisively the coding aspect). With only code, you’re just a developer. It’s the interpretation that makes it the humanities (assuming the projects are humanistic in nature; a scientist interpreting data is not a digital humanist). It’s using historical information, cultural literacy, and just good old-fashioned hunches to make sense of the data.

I loved Moretti’s quote from Brecht Herr Keuner “Could we not, in the interest of propaganda, draw up a list of the questions that appear to us completely unsolved?” Humanities aren’t dead. Even in the questions deal with the past, like Moretti’s study of 1800’s novels, questions remained unsolved, correlations untested, and assumptions untested. If you’re game to tackle these premises with a digital bend, well, you’re in.