The Computational Turn in Arts and Humanities
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SWANSEA UNIVERSITY
9TH MARCH 2010
David Berry, Department of Political and Cultural Studies, Swansea
University.
<mailto:(d.m.berry /at/ swansea.ac.uk)>(d.m.berry /at/ swansea.ac.uk)
The application of new computational techniques and visualisation
technologies in the Arts & Humanities are resulting in new
approaches and methodologies for the study of traditional and new
corpuses of Arts and Humanities materials. This new 'computation
turn' takes the methods and techniques from computer science to
create new ways of distant and close readings of texts (e.g.
Moretti). This one-day workshop aims to discuss the implications and
applications of what Lev Manovich has called 'Cultural Analytics'
and the question of finding patterns using algorthmic techniques.
Some of the most startling approaches transform understandings of
texts by use of network analysis (e.g. graph theory), database/XML
encodings (which flatten structures), or merely provide new
quantitative techniques for looking at various media forms, such as
media and film, and (re)presenting them visually, aurally or
haptically. Within this field there are important debates about the
contrast between narrative against database techniques,
pattern-matching versus hermeneutic reading, and the statistical
paradigm (using a sample) versus the data mining paradigm.
Additionally, new forms of collaboration within the Arts and
Humanities are emerging which use team-based approaches as opposed
to the traditional lone-scholar. This requires the ability to create
and manage modular Arts and Humanities research teams through the
organisational structures provided by technology and digital
communications (e.g. Big Humanities), together with techniques for
collaborating in an interdisciplinary way with other disciplines
such as computer science (e.g. hard interdisciplinarity versus soft
interdisciplinarity).
Papers are encouraged in the following areas:
- Distant versus Close Reading
- Database Structure versus Argument
- Data mining/Text mining/Patterns
- Pattern as a new epistemological object
- Hermeneutics and the Data Stream
- Geospatial techniques
- Big Humanities
- Digital Humanities versus Traditional Humanities
- Tool Building
- Collaboration, Assemblages and Alliances
- Language and Code (software studies)
- Philosophical and theoretical reflections on the computational turn
Participation Requirements
Workshop participants are requested to submit a position paper about
the computational turn in Arts and Humanities,
philosophical/theoretical reflections on the computational turn,
research focus or research questions related to computational
approaches, proposals for academic practice with
algorithmic/visualisation techniques, proposals for new research
methods with regard to Arts and Humanities or specific case studies
(if applicable) and findings to date. Position papers will be
published in a workshop PDF and website for discussion and some of
the participants will be invited to present their paper at the
workshop. Please ensure you put 'The Computational Turn' in the
subject line of the email submission.
Deadline for Position papers: February 10, 2010
Email papers to: <mailto:(d.m.berry /at/ swansea.ac.uk)>(d.m.berry /at/ swansea.ac.uk)
Workshop funded by The Callaghan Centre for the Study of Conflict,
Power, Empire, Swansea University. The Research Institute in the
Arts and Humanities (RIAH) at Swansea University.
References
Clement, Tanya E. (2008) 'A thing not beginning and not ending':
using digital tools to distant-read Gertrude Stein's The Making of
Americans. Literary and Linguistic Computing. 23.3 (2008): 361.
Clement, Tanya, Steger, Sara, Unsworth, John, Uszkalo, Kirsten
(2008) How Not to Read a Million Books. Retrieved 10/11/09 from
<http://www3.isrl.illinois.edu/~unsworth/hownot2read.html>http://www3.isrl.illinois.edu/~unsworth/hownot2read.html
Council on Library and Information Resources and The National
Endowment for the Humanities (2009) Working Together or Apart:
Promoting the Next Generation of Digital Scholarship. Retrieved
10/11/09 from
<http://www.clir.org/pubs/reports/pub145/pub145.pdf>http://www.clir.org/pubs/reports/pub145/pub145.pdf
Hayles, N. Katherine (2009) RFID: Human Agency and Meaning in
Information-Intensive Environments. Theory, Culture and Society
26.2/3 (2009): 1-24.
Hayles, N. Katherine (2009) How We Think: The Transforming Power of
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<http://hdl.handle.net/1853/27680>http://hdl.handle.net/1853/27680
Kittler, Fredrich (1997) Literature, Media, Information Systems.
London: Routledge.
Krakauer, David C. (2007) The Quest for Patterns in Meta-History.
Santa Fe Institute Bulletin. Winter 2007. Retrieved 10/11/09 from
<http://www.intelros.ru/pdf/SFI_Bulletin/Quest.pdf>http://www.intelros.ru/pdf/SFI_Bulletin/Quest.pdf
Latour, Bruno (2007) Reassembling the Social. London: Oxford University Press.
Manovich, Lev (2002) The Language of New Media. MIT Press.
Manovich, Lev (2007) White paper: Cultural Analytics: Analysis and
Visualizations of Large Cultural Data Sets, May 2007. Retrieved
10/11/09 from
<http://softwarestudies.com/cultural_analytics/cultural_analytics_2008.doc>http://softwarestudies.com/cultural_analytics/cultural_analytics_2008.doc
McLemee, Scott (2006) Literature to Infinity. Inside Higher Ed.
Retrieved 10/11/09 from
<http://www.insidehighered.com/views/mclemee/mclemee193>http://www.insidehighered.com/views/mclemee/mclemee193
Moretti, Franco (2005) Graphs, Maps, Trees: Abstract Models for a
Literary History. London: Verso.
Robinson, Peter (2006) Electronic Textual Editing: The Canterbury
Tales and other Medieval Texts. Electronic Textual Editing. Modern
Language Association of America. Retrieved 10/11/09
from
<http://www.tei-c.org/About/Archive_new/ETE/Preview/robinson.xml>http://www.tei-c.org/About/Archive_new/ETE/Preview/robinson.xml
Schreibman, Susan, Siemens, Ray & Unsworth, John (2007) A Companion
to Digital Humanities. London: WileyBlackwell.
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Dr. David M. Berry
Department of Political and Cultural Studies
Room KH029
Keir Hardie Building
Swansea University
Singleton Campus
Swansea
SA2 8PP
Tel: 01792 602633
<http://www.swansea.ac.uk/staff/academic/Arts/berryd/>http://www.swansea.ac.uk/staff/academic/Arts/berryd/
