It seems to me that the acquisition and use of new technology is inevitable for virtually every human being in the industrialized world. If you look back only 20 years, having a cell phone and a computer, let alone the internet, was considered a luxury for the privileged elite. Now, one is virtually incapable of functioning in this world without them. I mean, even my 80 year old grandmother has a cell phone, uses email, and knows how to manipulate images in Photoshop!
It is true that some individuals resist acquiring new technology longer than others. But eventually all of us will give in, if not by desire, then at least by necessity. Hasn’t history already proven this fact? Imagine using a horse-drawn carriage to get around Los Angeles or using a telegraph to relay an urgent message to a distant relative in today’s world. Times change, and the way in which we live and function as human beings changes along with it. Everyone has to adapt to technological progress at one point or another.
This seems to be the situation that the Humanities, and the University in general, is currently in. If technological adaptation is an inevitable reality for every man, woman and child in this country, why would institutions expect to remain exempt. To me, Digital Humanists are simply realists. They have merely taken an honest look at the direction the world is heading and have realized the unavoidable path that the Humanities eventually must follow. So why not get ahead of the game.
The views of Jerome McGann seem to resonate most with me. McGann recognizes the impact that technology is having on academic institutions. He states, “our scholarship is facing a future that is at once certain and uncertain. It is going to be cast and maintained and disseminated in digital forms. We may not now approve of this but it is nonetheless inevitable. We may not now know how to do this but we will learn. Because we have no choice” (112). Yet McGann isn’t merely making predictions. He identifies specific ways in which technology has already impacted scholarship, particularly in the Humanities. From research libraries and manuscript archives to the editing, peer review and publication process, scholars will eventually “carry out the major part of [their] productive educational work in digital forms” (111-112). Technology is dramatically changing the academic world and it is not going to stop anytime soon.
So if Humanists will eventually have to embrace technological changes, the question I have is whether or not there really is a need for a separate discipline called “the Digital Humanities.” Won’t Humanists themselves eventually need to realize the significance of technology on cultural production as well as the usefulness of technology for cultural analysis? Does there really need to be a separate entity called the Digital Humanities or does the Humanities simply need to expand its scope to embrace more digital forms of human culture?
What do you all think?
First, I think that is more than 140 words. Just kidding.
Anyway, I definitely agree with you. Oddly enough, I too read through (most) of the articles and took notes on the ones I found most interesting in regards to not only the topic, but the ones that best explained the DH and found McGann to be my favorite. I don’t want to mention what I feel about the article in too much detail because then I won’t have much to say in my own topic post, but I do want to point out a couple of things that I wanted to say in regards to your post.
I agree with your statement where you said that DH are realists and how they are simply taking where the world is going and running with it, however, I find myself as part of that crowd, and yet against it. I am fascinated with what we are going to be doing in this class and what it is all about, but at the same time, I want to hold back and stick with the times that are already fading away. I like my books, I love the idea of paper and print. It was amazing to see the photograph of Homer’s work in class but at the same time, I find myself holding back and not fully jumping on board. I’m so excited to be able to have such amazing access to things that I wouldn’t normally be able to see, read, or study, but at the same time, it’s almost a feeling of, ‘if I can’t have the real thing, I don’t want it at all.” I sound horrible, but I’m sure everyone is hesitant at first, right? I think that eventually, once there is a better understanding (since it seems impossible to have a mutual one) of DH, more people will be welcoming of it. However, I also believe that while the humanities and the digital humanities won’t always be seen as entirely separate entities and perhaps they will be seen as a “marriage”, as our classmate said, there will still be individuals who will continue to separate the two…maybe…
By the way, your grandmother is awesome. Not even my mom can text.
I think you both brought up interesting ideas about the effect(s) the developments in technology have on the Humanities (as well as other disciplines). Mostly, it seems as though you focus on the change in scholarship and the methods and tools of scholarship, which is similar to Bobley’s interview in which he describes the three fundamental ways that the Humanities is changing–Access, Production and Distribution, and Consumption–all of which are tools and forms.
What I wonder is: Does anyone think the content of the Humanities will change over time, due to these changes? Currently, the Humanities focuses on an exploration of the human condition and/or experience. If the human experience is digitalized, would would this exploration be of a digital experience, rather than a human one? Are they the same thing, or do they have different value systems that need to be taken into consideration? Does the medium affect the message, as McLuhan believes?
While digital humanists believe in open source and access for all (think creative commons), how do institutions like Google, who filter information for the majority of the population fit in? Does this contradict with the postmodern idea that “grand narratives” (in Lyotard’s sense) are gone? Are we all digital scholars who can critically comb through this information, or is the entire human experience completely created for us by the dominant search engine?
Some of this question could be readdressed in light of Brittney’s post on McGann. What does the Digital Humanities mean for our relationship with the past?
I feel that the DH means that we are more capable of having a proper relationship with the past, at least, through literature. What I mean by this is that we are able to, as you showed in class, view and have access to documents that we normally wouldn’t even dream of having access to. It’s like having an email relationship vs a video chat relationship. Ridiculous comparison, I know, but it’s the first thing that came to my mind. Reading something vs seeing something. We have excerpts of works in our Anthologies and translations within novels, but we never see the actual piece it is all derived from. We are able to analyze and study the past in a way that is more than just words, but through the actual images.,,
Did I just make no sense?
I also thought Landow’s “Hypertext” writing also provided an interesting answer to my question, as he finds a similar motivation in ideology of hypertext and that of poststructuralist literary movements: that we must “abandon conceptual systems found upon ideas center, margin, hierarchy, and linearity, and replace them by ones of mulitlinearity, nodes, links and networks.”
Dear Anthony,
I completely agree with your approach towards the Digital Humanities. I think because the department is still fresh and developing, there needs to be a name that separates if from the rest. I think eventually, the Humanities will be incorporated in the digital world where the “Digital Humanities” will no longer be considered a separate entity.
To answer Kristin’s questions, I am actually unsure about how the digitalized human experience will be, because I have not fully understood the digital humanities myself. For me, if the humanities were only about using technology, then I do not feel my experience would be the same. My way of supporting the digital humanities comes from the understanding that I would still be able to learn the printed classics by reading and writing, but my knowledge will be further enhanced through the use of the web and other technological means. I mean in the 1900’s, the modern world dehumanized people and left them in a condition where tradition was forgotten. I definitely wouldn’t want the humanities to stretch far away from its roots, but I feel the merging of two cultures (reading, writing, typing and researching with books or computers) can happen without having the experience be a “non-human one.”
Sincerely,
Tara
I also completely agree with your approach. Like Tara said, this department is farley new and still developing new ideas and concepts. Looking at Kristin’s question, I too do not know what the digitalized human experience would be, but taking a guess, it would probably not need the use of anything other then a computer, internet and of course technology along with the human mind. Digital Humanities is growing everyday with its typing, writing, researching, technology and internet. It will no longer be digitalized human experience but instead a normal process of everyday life. If we as a society of people did not “think outside the box” then, like Anthony said, we would still be riding carriages around Los Angeles. We as a class still have so much to learn about Digital Humanities as well as what a digitized human may or not.
I posted a reply to Kristin’s post that somewhat relates to this topic. It seems that technology has a complex relationship with the Humanities right now. On the one hand, it enables the preservation of literature and makes it more accessible than ever before. However, the actual reading experience itself is changing. Reading a book online requires that we filter out other distracting data such as ads, incoming, emails, chat windows, etc. We also have to make sure we are situated in close proximity to a power outlet if we want to read for a prolonged period of time. On top of it all, staring at a screen for too long can be just plain sore on your eyes. It doesn’t even matter if it is the exact same text, reading a printed book and reading a digital book are two completely different experiences.