Patty Cohen writes on the “digital humanities” in The New York Times today (22 March, 2001), and misses an opportunity to show us what information technology can do for the liberal arts. She highlights a few unrepresentative projects, and ignores the big question: What can the non-scientific researchers in literature, philosophy, history and the rest of the humanities concoct when given access to great stores of data, and how do they react? Cohen tells us a little and shows us less.
Humanists have always had data; what makes digital data different is the play and the display: you can see the data better and have some fun with it, too.
The title, for which Cohen may not be responsible, is “Giving Literature Virtual Life.” But her story is lifeless.
At the University of Virginia, history undergraduates have produced a digital visualization of the college’s first library collection, allowing them to consider what the selection of books says about how knowledge was classified in the early 18th century.
A library visualization? What does that mean? I would need to see such a thing. Even online, the story offers no link. So here it is, for all to see. Two things make make this a visual representation of the 1828 U. Va. library catalog: maps that neatly mark where the books came from and charts that reveal what they were about. The VisualEyes technology that supports this project allows humanists to create visualizations; ten such projects are demonstrated at that link.
Cohen spends a lot of time at Bryn Mawr College, gushing about teaching Shakespeare with
Their assignment was to create characters on the Web site theatron.org and use them to block scenes from the gory revenge tragedy “Titus Andronicus,” to see how setting can heighten the drama.
…
“Until you get Shakespeare on its feet, you’re doing it an injustice,” [student] Ms. Cook said. “The plays are in 3-D, not 2-D.”
Cook lacks a basic understanding of what three-dimensional means, believing perhaps it was invented by James Cameron for Avatar. Shakespeare’s plays were created indeed as performances. Until you see them performed, or better yet, get on your feet and perform them, you are doing the Bard an injustice indeed.
Cohen writes thats scholars are only beginning to explore “the contours of this emerging field of digital humanities.” I approve of the metaphor, but reporters too have much more to learn.
Paul Statt Communications 