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Thanks for the link @quinndupont. Do you care to elaborate about what is better about Kirenschenbaum's analsysis? What, I mean, is the substance of your opinion

Thanks for the link @quinndupont. Do you care to elaborate about what is better about Kirenschenbaum's analsysis? What, I mean, is the substance of your opinion?

quinndupont 11y ago
I would suggest that it is more a matter of position. Kirschenbaum writes from within mainstream DH, and is aware of the many discussions of DH that have occurred since its inception in 1949[1] (an arbitrary, but useful date). In another work of his (and he's not the only one analysing these matters), he lampoons the kinds of critique offered by Ethan Miller. Kirschenbaum writes: "Herewith, then, are some of the terrible things of my title, hardly any of which are exaggerated for effect: Digital humanities is a nest of big data ideologues. Digital humanities digs MOOCs. Digital humanities is an artifact of the post-9/11 security and surveillance state (the NSA of the MLA). Like Johnny, digital humanities can’t read. Digital humanities doesn’t do theory. Digital humanities never historicizes. Digital humanities is complicit. Digital humanities is naive. Digital humanities is hollow huckster boosterism. Digital humanities is managerial. Digital humanities is the academic import of Silicon Valley solutionism (the term that is the shibboleth of bad-boy tech critic Evgeny Morozov). Digital humanities cannot abide critique. Digital humanities appeals to those in search of an oasis from the concerns of race, class, gender, and sexuality. Digital humanities does not inhale (easily the best line of the bunch). Digital humanities wears Google Glass. Digital humanities wears thick, thick glasses (guilty). Perhaps most damning of all: digital humanities is something separate from the rest of the humanities, and—this is the real secret—digital humanities wants it that way. Terrible things indeed these are!"[2] Miller reiterates many of these positions without acknowledgement that not only have they been discussed before, they have even become points of ridicule. Perhaps one does not need to agree with those within DH, like Kirschenbaum, but to regurgitate "MOOCs", "silicon valley" and "big data" without at least a passing familiarity with the discussions that have been going on is more than a little shallow. Yet, DH usually thinks of itself as "big tent", so competing histories and conceptions are part of its very fabric, and sure to be welcomed. The problem with assessments of DH from the outside is that they usually end up rather unsavoury and polemic, hence Kirschenbaum's invocation of William Pannapacker's rabble rousing and the attendant fallout. [1] http://www.digitalhumanities.org/companion/view?docId=blackwell/9781405103213/9781405103213.xml&chunk.id=ss1-2-1 http://www.digitalhumanities.org/companion/view?docId=blackw... [2] https://mkirschenbaum.files.wordpress.com/2014/04/dhterriblethingskirschenbaum.pdf https://mkirschenbaum.files.wordpress.com/2014/04/dhterrible...
- ethanmiller 11y ago
  I think you might be right about the perspective being partly a matter of "position". Looking over your own impressive body of work, I can see that you are also a deep traveller in this world. So first off, much respect for all the good work. I think, however, you misread the text, or rather projected a certain easily dismissed critique onto it. My point was to understand what digital humanities is, as I put it, as an "epiphenomenon of the tectonic encounter between this world of computing, with its newly acquired 'Silicon Valley sex appeal,' and the world of ideas." The point of the supposed "Sex Appeal" line is not to denigrate the importance of computing or the digital humanities; quite to the contrary, it is to note that in contrast to the past computing has been elevated to a level of cultural importance that perhaps matches the revolutionary nature of the technological changes it has produced. I agree completely with Kirschenbaum in the passage you quoted above when he rejects the notion that: "Digital humanities is complicit. Digital humanities is naive. Digital humanities is hollow huckster boosterism. Digital humanities is managerial. Digital humanities is the academic import of Silicon Valley solutionism...." My point here is precisely that "digital humanities" is that domain through which the academy is renegotiating its relationship to the broader culture, redefining the relationship of its traditional values of critique in relationship to the properties of the cultural world "outside" that is being so radically redefined by computing. In other words, I see digital humanities as one of the most exciting cultural sites of complex cultural transformation that there is today, and in no way am I reiterating the critique to which your refer. One point, however, where I'd like to challenge you. Your reference to "position" is I think an interesting one because it points to a fairly traditional approach to professional formation in the academy. It's a fairly common posture within a new or emerging profession to attempt to establish a "domain", to establish lines of jurisdictional control, and to begin to build a historical narrative that grounds that new domain in time, giving it a "tradition." There's a certain parallel here between the myth-building that goes along with constructing national narratives to reinforce the idea of the nation and what the myth-building that professions do about their own history. This I would suggest is why the 1949 date is so "useful," as you put it. It provides digital humanities with its own ontology. That said, one of the things I find interesting about digital humanities is the way it is on some level potentially so fundamentally interdisciplinary. Indeed, one of the interesting consequences of thinking of digital humanities not as a traditional "profession" but rather, as I did here, as a site of cultural renegotiation, as a "tectonic" meeting of cultural spheres, capable of creating a cultural "quake" (forgive the metaphors), is that it eludes this tendency to define a profession in terms of a specific domain and orthodoxy. So I guess what I am suggesting here is in some respects an alternative and unorthodox way of assessing the growth of a new sphere of cultural production and exploration. I wonder if this isn't particularly appropriate for the digital humanities. So I guess that's my question for you: would you like to see the digital humanities as its own professional domain, e.g. one day that every university will have its "Digital Humanities" or "Humanities Computing" department? I wonder, somehow, if this kind of outcome would mean that the kind of cultural renegotiation that I was (rather hopefully) anticipating had fallen on its face. Curious to know what you think.

Thanks for the link @quinndupont. Do you care to elaborate about what is better about Kirenschenbaum's analsysis? What, I mean, is the substance of your opinion?

quinndupont 11y ago

I would suggest that it is more a matter of position. Kirschenbaum writes from within mainstream DH, and is aware of the many discussions of DH that have occurred since its inception in 1949[1] (an arbitrary, but useful date). In another work of his (and he's not the only one analysing these matters), he lampoons the kinds of critique offered by Ethan Miller. Kirschenbaum writes: "Herewith, then, are some of the terrible things of my title, hardly any of which are exaggerated for effect: Digital humanities is a nest of big data ideologues. Digital humanities digs MOOCs. Digital humanities is an artifact of the post-9/11 security and surveillance state (the NSA of the MLA). Like Johnny, digital humanities can’t read. Digital humanities doesn’t do theory. Digital humanities never historicizes. Digital humanities is complicit. Digital humanities is naive. Digital humanities is hollow huckster boosterism. Digital humanities is managerial. Digital humanities is the academic import of Silicon Valley solutionism (the term that is the shibboleth of bad-boy tech critic Evgeny Morozov). Digital humanities cannot abide critique. Digital humanities appeals to those in search of an oasis from the concerns of race, class, gender, and sexuality. Digital humanities does not inhale (easily the best line of the bunch). Digital humanities wears Google Glass. Digital humanities wears thick, thick glasses (guilty). Perhaps most damning of all: digital humanities is something separate from the rest of the humanities, and—this is the real secret—digital humanities wants it that way. Terrible things indeed these are!"[2] Miller reiterates many of these positions without acknowledgement that not only have they been discussed before, they have even become points of ridicule. Perhaps one does not need to agree with those within DH, like Kirschenbaum, but to regurgitate "MOOCs", "silicon valley" and "big data" without at least a passing familiarity with the discussions that have been going on is more than a little shallow. Yet, DH usually thinks of itself as "big tent", so competing histories and conceptions are part of its very fabric, and sure to be welcomed. The problem with assessments of DH from the outside is that they usually end up rather unsavoury and polemic, hence Kirschenbaum's invocation of William Pannapacker's rabble rousing and the attendant fallout. [1] http://www.digitalhumanities.org/companion/view?docId=blackwell/9781405103213/9781405103213.xml&chunk.id=ss1-2-1 http://www.digitalhumanities.org/companion/view?docId=blackw... [2] https://mkirschenbaum.files.wordpress.com/2014/04/dhterriblethingskirschenbaum.pdf https://mkirschenbaum.files.wordpress.com/2014/04/dhterrible...

ethanmiller 11y ago
I think you might be right about the perspective being partly a matter of "position". Looking over your own impressive body of work, I can see that you are also a deep traveller in this world. So first off, much respect for all the good work. I think, however, you misread the text, or rather projected a certain easily dismissed critique onto it. My point was to understand what digital humanities is, as I put it, as an "epiphenomenon of the tectonic encounter between this world of computing, with its newly acquired 'Silicon Valley sex appeal,' and the world of ideas." The point of the supposed "Sex Appeal" line is not to denigrate the importance of computing or the digital humanities; quite to the contrary, it is to note that in contrast to the past computing has been elevated to a level of cultural importance that perhaps matches the revolutionary nature of the technological changes it has produced. I agree completely with Kirschenbaum in the passage you quoted above when he rejects the notion that: "Digital humanities is complicit. Digital humanities is naive. Digital humanities is hollow huckster boosterism. Digital humanities is managerial. Digital humanities is the academic import of Silicon Valley solutionism...." My point here is precisely that "digital humanities" is that domain through which the academy is renegotiating its relationship to the broader culture, redefining the relationship of its traditional values of critique in relationship to the properties of the cultural world "outside" that is being so radically redefined by computing. In other words, I see digital humanities as one of the most exciting cultural sites of complex cultural transformation that there is today, and in no way am I reiterating the critique to which your refer. One point, however, where I'd like to challenge you. Your reference to "position" is I think an interesting one because it points to a fairly traditional approach to professional formation in the academy. It's a fairly common posture within a new or emerging profession to attempt to establish a "domain", to establish lines of jurisdictional control, and to begin to build a historical narrative that grounds that new domain in time, giving it a "tradition." There's a certain parallel here between the myth-building that goes along with constructing national narratives to reinforce the idea of the nation and what the myth-building that professions do about their own history. This I would suggest is why the 1949 date is so "useful," as you put it. It provides digital humanities with its own ontology. That said, one of the things I find interesting about digital humanities is the way it is on some level potentially so fundamentally interdisciplinary. Indeed, one of the interesting consequences of thinking of digital humanities not as a traditional "profession" but rather, as I did here, as a site of cultural renegotiation, as a "tectonic" meeting of cultural spheres, capable of creating a cultural "quake" (forgive the metaphors), is that it eludes this tendency to define a profession in terms of a specific domain and orthodoxy. So I guess what I am suggesting here is in some respects an alternative and unorthodox way of assessing the growth of a new sphere of cultural production and exploration. I wonder if this isn't particularly appropriate for the digital humanities. So I guess that's my question for you: would you like to see the digital humanities as its own professional domain, e.g. one day that every university will have its "Digital Humanities" or "Humanities Computing" department? I wonder, somehow, if this kind of outcome would mean that the kind of cultural renegotiation that I was (rather hopefully) anticipating had fallen on its face. Curious to know what you think.