Course Description

MW 2:00-3:20 | B181 JFSB

In many ways, the humanities are already digital: whether you’re working on The Odyssey or Only Revolutions, most of us do our research, writing, and sometimes reading at a computer. In these situations, the computer replaces the index, the pen, and the printed book. In a sense, then, the computer has simply sped up processes with which humanists were already familiar.

But what might we gain if we begin to use the computer to do something that only it can do? How would it change our understanding of a novel if we laid it out in geographical space? What would it mean to look at every frame of a film at once? What could we discover if we read everything a prolific author wrote, in just two weeks? And what if we turn the tables and decide to look at digital objects the same way we typically look at novels or films?

In this course, we will consider these questions as we explore the field of digital humanities (DH). Through readings and various projects, we will familiarize ourselves with the concepts, tools, and debates of and within DH.

Course Goals

• To strengthen your testimony of the gospel
• To become familiar and conversant with various concepts and methods in the digital humanities
• To collaborate in a field that has traditionally privileged individual scholarship
• To become more skilled writers through an engagement with writing as a public process