5 ms·

As the top reddit comment points out, a sad read. Also note this post is 2 years old. It makes me wonder - are there opportunities for a digital hybrid of tech

As the top reddit comment points out, a sad read. Also note this post is 2 years old. It makes me wonder - are there opportunities for a digital hybrid of techie and historian? The data hoarder subreddits come to mind but they tend to be focused on tech itself or unfocused in what data they collect. Though even if you could maintain and do analysis on a digitized archive of a specific subject I wonder what kind of market there is for that since that’s kind of what libraries have become?

BugsJustFindMe 5y ago
> Also note this post is 2 years old. The History job market now is not better than it was 2-3 years ago. If anything it's worse, and schools continue to pump out PhDs like it just doesn't matter that they're tricking kids into burning the better part of a decade for less than nothing (average time to complete in the US is 7-8 years!)
- meowkit 5y ago
  Sorry not to imply otherwise. More as a literal note as I find myself assuming the things I’m reading are recently posted and not 2, 5, 10 or more years old.
- sho_hn 5y ago
  Makes me wonder: Are we failing to teach how to apply history to present-day problems, or do we as a society really value history so little?
  - Chris2048 5y ago
    What does this mean? I thought (Marxian) historical-analysis was a debunked pursuit?
    - sho_hn 5y ago
      I'm wondering why there aren't more jobs for historians outside academia, I guess.
      - cfmcdonald 5y ago
        Large companies used to have company historians and company archivists. Some still do. There were probably never very many of those, though. The new policy seems to be to throw the (digital) archives down the memory hole to avoid lawsuits.
  - lotsofpulp 5y ago
    The application of history to the vast majority of people's lives is probably pretty low on the list of priorities. Shelter, food, water, air, income, healthcare, childcare, vacations, and then maybe history comes into play as a component of entertainment.
    - munificent 5y ago
      Ironically, a failure to learn from history is often what leads to large-scale failures to provide for those other priorities.
    - AlotOfReading 5y ago
      To contextualize, I'm an archaeologist by education and consider that a subfield of 'history'. Most people have incredibly strong attachments to (specific bits) of history. It's often be inseparable from culture, national identity, and religion. However, it's difficult to justify that funding politically over things like building another warship (to keep us safe!), building a supercomputer (to keep us innovative!), or subsidizing corporate entities (to save jobs!). There's also no commercial market for building national identity. Accordingly, most funding comes out of relatively small culture/arts budgets that don't have to answer directly to constituents, except for a very few things that meet the incredibly high bar of direct political support like the national parks and pyramids. But if you're interested in how humans have adapted to climate change in the past, or how to design a resilient society, or how pandemics spread, you're going to need historical studies at some point.
  - chmod600 5y ago
    Stories are incredibly valuable to humans, on the same level as survival. People see themselves continuously as playing a role in a story than spans millenia. That's what "identity" is really about, and it underlies war, crime, achievement, religion, raising of families, etc. Historians could be the leaders here, but for whatever reason they are not. Historians haven't put themselves in a position where they could guide human stories for society overall. So do they have potential value? Yes. But either they aren't able to provide it, or we aren't able to accept it. Instead we have media narratives, which are a sad substitute.
Arainach 5y ago
>digital hybrid of techie and historian This area is called digital archival: https://ndsa.org/conference/ https://ndsa.org/conference/ https://www.imaging.org/site/IST/Conferences/Archiving/IST/Conferences/Archiving/Archiving_Home.aspx https://www.imaging.org/site/IST/Conferences/Archiving/IST/C...
brightball 5y ago
I've been toying with the idea of setting up a blog talking about various bits of history that I read. I used to hate history, but it's much more interesting to read when compared against "common knowledge" of what people believe.
AlotOfReading 5y ago
The intersection of tech and history is known as 'digital humanities'. It's been in a recession for social/funding reasons the past few years, but it'll come back eventually.
WesleyLivesay 5y ago
There are certainly digital archivists at many institutions/organizations that are digitizing archives and things. The problem comes in from the fact that for most of human history things have not been digital, so there is only a very limited set of data that people can really "hoard." The problem is getting things digitized in the first place, and then not having the results just stuck behind yet another paywall. In many cases what is already digitized, much like what is shown at museums, is just the tip of the iceberg of information kept in non-digital forms.
beckingz 5y ago
This is sometimes referred to as digital humanities. Guy I knew was doing some really cool history work around German settlers in early America based on data collected by early life insurance companies.

BugsJustFindMe 5y ago

> Also note this post is 2 years old. The History job market now is not better than it was 2-3 years ago. If anything it's worse, and schools continue to pump out PhDs like it just doesn't matter that they're tricking kids into burning the better part of a decade for less than nothing (average time to complete in the US is 7-8 years!)

meowkit 5y ago
Sorry not to imply otherwise. More as a literal note as I find myself assuming the things I’m reading are recently posted and not 2, 5, 10 or more years old.
sho_hn 5y ago
Makes me wonder: Are we failing to teach how to apply history to present-day problems, or do we as a society really value history so little?
- Chris2048 5y ago
  What does this mean? I thought (Marxian) historical-analysis was a debunked pursuit?
  - sho_hn 5y ago
    I'm wondering why there aren't more jobs for historians outside academia, I guess.
    - cfmcdonald 5y ago
      Large companies used to have company historians and company archivists. Some still do. There were probably never very many of those, though. The new policy seems to be to throw the (digital) archives down the memory hole to avoid lawsuits.
- lotsofpulp 5y ago
  The application of history to the vast majority of people's lives is probably pretty low on the list of priorities. Shelter, food, water, air, income, healthcare, childcare, vacations, and then maybe history comes into play as a component of entertainment.
  - munificent 5y ago
    Ironically, a failure to learn from history is often what leads to large-scale failures to provide for those other priorities.
  - AlotOfReading 5y ago
    To contextualize, I'm an archaeologist by education and consider that a subfield of 'history'. Most people have incredibly strong attachments to (specific bits) of history. It's often be inseparable from culture, national identity, and religion. However, it's difficult to justify that funding politically over things like building another warship (to keep us safe!), building a supercomputer (to keep us innovative!), or subsidizing corporate entities (to save jobs!). There's also no commercial market for building national identity. Accordingly, most funding comes out of relatively small culture/arts budgets that don't have to answer directly to constituents, except for a very few things that meet the incredibly high bar of direct political support like the national parks and pyramids. But if you're interested in how humans have adapted to climate change in the past, or how to design a resilient society, or how pandemics spread, you're going to need historical studies at some point.
- chmod600 5y ago
  Stories are incredibly valuable to humans, on the same level as survival. People see themselves continuously as playing a role in a story than spans millenia. That's what "identity" is really about, and it underlies war, crime, achievement, religion, raising of families, etc. Historians could be the leaders here, but for whatever reason they are not. Historians haven't put themselves in a position where they could guide human stories for society overall. So do they have potential value? Yes. But either they aren't able to provide it, or we aren't able to accept it. Instead we have media narratives, which are a sad substitute.

Arainach 5y ago

>digital hybrid of techie and historian This area is called digital archival: https://ndsa.org/conference/ https://ndsa.org/conference/ https://www.imaging.org/site/IST/Conferences/Archiving/IST/Conferences/Archiving/Archiving_Home.aspx https://www.imaging.org/site/IST/Conferences/Archiving/IST/C...

brightball 5y ago

I've been toying with the idea of setting up a blog talking about various bits of history that I read. I used to hate history, but it's much more interesting to read when compared against "common knowledge" of what people believe.

AlotOfReading 5y ago

The intersection of tech and history is known as 'digital humanities'. It's been in a recession for social/funding reasons the past few years, but it'll come back eventually.

WesleyLivesay 5y ago

There are certainly digital archivists at many institutions/organizations that are digitizing archives and things. The problem comes in from the fact that for most of human history things have not been digital, so there is only a very limited set of data that people can really "hoard." The problem is getting things digitized in the first place, and then not having the results just stuck behind yet another paywall. In many cases what is already digitized, much like what is shown at museums, is just the tip of the iceberg of information kept in non-digital forms.

beckingz 5y ago

This is sometimes referred to as digital humanities. Guy I knew was doing some really cool history work around German settlers in early America based on data collected by early life insurance companies.