The definition of Digital Humanities (DH) by AI states DH as “an interdisciplinary field that integrates computational tools and methods with traditional humanities disciplines”.
As an international student, the word humanity is scary. Coming from a STEM-driven family, for the majority of my life I was indoctrinated to believe that the humanities are merely for appreciation, to make me look cultured at the dinner table. Developing any sort of humanistic work would sentence me to a life of unfulfillment and financial instability.
Mathematical Economics was my compromise. I have always been fascinated by statistics and data analysis, and it sounds mouthful enough to satisfy the STEM freaks that I call family. I was fortunate enough to fall in love with the field, but I always had a true passion: policy & politics.
My best, most honest, and raw work was produced in the context of policy. Watching the complicated balance between people, power, processes, society, and beliefs evolve with the rise of new technology fuels me to constantly learn and stay updated on what is happening in my surroundings, locally, regionally, and even globally.
This first week felt like a deja vu of my Introduction to Public Policy class in a very particular way. Thinking about UX Design immediately transported me to my class about stakeholder analysis and adapting to different needs and expectations; project management made me think about policy implementation; even our introductory section, about failure, collaboration, building castles and logs sounded familiar.
The common trait between policy and DH is people. Is made by people, for people. Regardless of whether it is a computer or a bill in between, my view of the Digital Humanities is extremely rooted in people. Just as policymaking, DH is born from a need. The need for accessibility of information in a digital era. I could send 1000 thesis to my grandmother in Senegal, she would probably not get past line 3, but sending her a link with a map, videos, and pictures would resonate with her, even though she does not speak a word of English.
DH becomes a language itself, challenging me to display knowledge in different, more creative ways. Reflecting upon my project itself, bringing a Digital Humanities context to electoral policy allowed me to view the same events from angles that I did not even know existed. I was able to draw connections between policies in different countries, and their effect on the democratic process, even creating my own metadata with symbols on a whiteboard.
In the following weeks, I look forward to expanding my own interpretations of Digital Humanities, thinking more about how the values of DH apply to not only my project but also my experience as a fellow. I hope that through openness, collaboration, and experimentation I am able to encompass a wider range of perspectives and stories, using different forms of data visualization to craft narratives that highlight the human stories behind the headlines.
While my STEM-driven family fostered in me a respect for data, analysis, and empirical rigor, DH is an opportunity to expand my perspectives, showing the value of human-centered approaches to technology and information.
One reply on “What is DH?”
Glad to see that the concept of “humanities” is something you are willing to embrace this summer, and that you can see how humanistic inquiry has the capacity to go beyond boundaries that we traditionally assign to humanities fields. The idea of DH as a language is intriguing, I hope you continue to pull at that thread over the summer.