Found History

Likewise, no one pours new wine into old wineskins. Otherwise, the wine will burst the skins, and both the wine and the skins are ruined. Rather, new wine is poured into fresh wineskins. – Mark 2:22 Since the time of my first foray into digital humanities as a newly minted graduate working on a project [...]

[Read more →]

One of the things that people often notice when they enter the field of digital humanities is how nice everybody is. This can be in stark contrast to other (unnamed) disciplines where suspicion, envy, and territoriality sometimes seem to rule. By contrast, our most commonly used bywords are “collegiality,” “openness,” and “collaboration.” We welcome new [...]

[Read more →]

After giving my “groundrules” speech for a third THATCamp on Saturday, I realized I hadn’t published it anywhere for broader dissemination and possible reuse by the THATCamp community. So here they are, THATCamp’s three groundrules: THATCamp is FUN – That means no reading papers, no powerpoint presentations, no extended project demos, and especially no grandstanding. [...]

[Read more →]

Dan Cohen and I have been brewing a proposal for an edited book entitled Hacking the Academy. Let’s write it together, starting at THATCamp. And let’s do it in one week. Can an algorithm edit a journal? Can a library exist without books? Can students build and manage their own learning management platforms? Can a [...]

[Read more →]

Yet more evidence big associations have lost the plot: watch nine sessions of AAM online for only … $300?!? — The American Association of Museums (AAM) has announced that it will host its first “virtual conference” during this year’s annual meeting in Los Angeles. I understand AAM’s motivation here. They’re surely hoping to recover some [...]

[Read more →]

The criticism most frequently leveled at digital humanities is what I like to call the “Where’s the beef?” question, that is, what questions does digital humanities answer that can’t be answered without it? What humanities arguments does digital humanities make? Concern over the apparent lack of argument in digital humanities comes not only from outside [...]

[Read more →]

Two Reviews of NARA Civil War Exhibit — Last week The Washington Post and The New York Times each reviewed the National Archives’ new Civil War Sesquicentennial exhibit, Discovering the Civil War. I haven’t seen the exhibit yet myself, but I’d characterize both reviews as “mixed.” Hat tip: Lee White of the National Coalition for [...]

[Read more →]