Serendipity35

In an article by S.E. Smith on The Verge, the author says that "Every few days, I open my inbox to an email from someone asking after an old article of mine that they can’t find. They’re graduate students, activists, teachers setting up their syllabus, researchers, fellow journalists, or simply people with a frequently revisited bookmark, not understanding why a link suddenly goes nowhere. They’re people who searched the internet and found references, but not the article itself, and are trying to track an idea down to its source. They’re readers trying to understand the throughlines of society and culture, ranging from peak feminist blogging of the 2010s to shifts in cultural attitudes about disability, but coming up empty."

A recent Pew Research Center study on digital decay found that 38 percent of webpages accessible in 2013 are not accessible today. Pages are taken down, URLs are changed, and entire websites vanish. This happens with personal website and blogs but also with scientific journals and local news sites.

Yes, there are places like the wonderful Internet Archive that tries to preserve some sites and pages, but even that is incomplete if their archived version links to a dead page. I can find some archived versions of my own logs and websites in that archive but it is hardle complete. A complete archive would be an impossible task.

The article was titled What happens when the internet disappears? but the Internet itself is not disappearing, though significant prts of it are already gone.

During my time working at the New Jersey Institute of Technology, I had quite robust personal website. This blog actually was hosted there at the beginning. Thankfully, Tim and I moved Serendipity35 before both of us left the university. I was able to change links on my website to point to new locations of mine, but although for some reason my webspace still is online, I don't have privileges to change anything anymore. That means that things that are out of date or just plain wrong are still there - and people do find those pages.

A page I have there about some early experimenting I did with the crude chatbot ELIZA was found by a researcher writing about the chatbot's history, and a producer from BBC Radio found it and did an interview with me about it for a program. I wish I could update it, but that's not possible on that server.

Smith says in that article "Every digital media format, from the Bernoulli Box to the racks of servers slowly boiling the planet, is ultimately doomed to obsolescence as it’s supplanted by the next innovation, with even the Library of Congress struggling to preserve digital archives."

Books and letters crumble, artwork disintegrates and photography fades, and though we try to save the most important things, we don't know what will be important in the next century.

To finish this week of posts about digital humanities, I thought I should look to the future of DH. I have no more powers of prognostication than other people in education, and predicting trends that involve technology is particularly difficult -and often very inaccurate.

The future of digital humanities is likely to be shaped by at least three things: ongoing technological advancements, changes in scholarly practices, and evolving research questions. As challenging as it is to predict specific developments, there are some trends and potential directions that may characterize the future of the field.

Integration of AI and Machine Learning: As artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning technologies continue to advance, we can expect to see increased integration of these tools into digital humanities research. AI algorithms could be used for tasks such as text analysis, image recognition, and data mining, enabling scholars to uncover new insights and patterns in large-scale humanities data.

Virtual and augmented reality technologies have the potential to revolutionize how we engage with cultural heritage sites, historical artifacts, and literary works. Future digital humanities projects may leverage these technologies to create immersive experiences that allow users to explore historical environments, interact with digital reconstructions of ancient texts, or experience literary narratives in new ways.

Digital humanities research has become increasingly reliant on data-driven methodologies and digital technologies, and like scholars in other fields, DH scholars will need to grapple with ethical and social implications. This includes issues related to data privacy, algorithmic bias, and the democratization of access to digital cultural heritage.

The DH community is already more global and is likely to become more diverse and globally interconnected, with scholars from around the world collaborating on projects that reflect a wide range of cultural perspectives and traditions. One would hope that this could lead to new insights into global history, literature, and culture, as well as a greater emphasis on decolonizing digital humanities scholarship.

The interdisciplinary collaboration I wrote about earlier should also put some additional focus on interdisciplinary education and training. Students need to be better equipped with the skills and expertise needed to navigate the complex intersection of technology and the humanities. This could involve partnerships between humanities departments and computer science programs, as well as the development of new curricula that integrate digital methods into traditional humanities disciplines.

 

I wrote earlier this week about what I see happening in the digital humanities, some history, and the biggest shift I have observed. Today I'm thinking about what is called the "public humanities."

The term public humanities refers to activities, initiatives, and scholarship within the humanities that engage with broader public audiences outside of academia. It encompasses a range of practices aimed at making humanistic knowledge and perspectives accessible, relevant, and meaningful to diverse communities beyond the traditional confines of the university.

I think the goal of public humanities is to bridge the gap between academia and the wider public. This can mean democratizing access to humanistic knowledge. It is an effort to foster a deeper appreciation for the value of the humanities in contemporary society. It reflects a commitment to the idea that the humanities have relevance and significance beyond the walls of the university and can contribute to the enrichment of public life and the promotion of democratic ideals.

How can this be accomplished? It often involves collaboration with community organizations, cultural institutions, and non-profit groups. A meaningful dialogue and partnerships with local communities can help address issues of shared concern and interest. This kind of civic engagement may encourage promoting critical thinking, cultural literacy, historical awareness and may also address social justice issues and advocate for positive social change.

DH programs can include public lectures, workshops, film screenings, exhibitions, and other events that bring together scholars, artists, activists, and members of the public to explore topics of cultural, historical, or philosophical significance.

Digital technologies can help the humanities reach wider audiences through online platforms, digital archives, social media, and interactive multimedia projects.

Public scholarship is something that public humanities scholars often produce. This is work that is accessible to non-specialist audiences, such as books, articles, podcasts, and blog posts. They may also contribute to public debates and discussions on contemporary issues, drawing on insights from the humanities to inform public discourse.

I found this recent article on humanitieswatch.org listing ten forms of public humanities.

1.     public-facing academic work
2.     knowledge derived from practitioners
3.     humanistic knowledge created through collaboration with people that come from various publics
4.     data on the humanities in public
5.     activism informed by humanities research
6.     policymaking related to the humanities
7.     the value of the humanities in the public, and of the public humanities in academia
8.     graduate programs in public humanities
9.     pedagogy for public humanities;
10.  histories, theories, and critiques of the field of public humanities.

I claim no expertise in the digital humanities (DH) but I feel like I have been involved or immersed in it since the 1990s. I wrote earlier this week about defining the field and about some history. In the past two decades, several shifts have occurred in the field.

Early on, DH projects often involved individual scholars or small teams working within specific disciplines. A major shift was in the growth of interdisciplinary collaboration. Scholars from diverse fields such as computer science, linguistics, history, literature, cultural studies, and others has led to developments in the digital humanities.

Interdisciplinary collaboration led to the development of innovative methodologies that draw on insights and techniques from multiple disciplines. For example, computer scientists may contribute expertise in data mining and machine learning, while historians provide domain knowledge and research questions.

Collaboration across disciplines also expanded the scope of research in the digital humanities, enabling scholars to tackle complex questions that transcend traditional disciplinary boundaries. This has led to new approaches to studying culture, history, literature, and other subjects.

Collaboration helped facilitate the development of shared infrastructure and resources, such as digital archives, data repositories, and software tools. These resources are often freely available and contribute to the growth of the digital humanities community.

Interdisciplinary collaboration has also enabled digital humanities scholars to engage with broader public audiences by creating accessible and engaging digital projects that communicate scholarly research in innovative ways. More about the public audience in a future post.