Reading Schedule

Readings are in CCLE unless they’re linked here. You can also download this syllabus as a PDF.

Week One: Overview

Key terms: digital humanities, mediation, episteme, techne

1A: October 6

What is digital humanities? What is a digital humanities project?
Lecture slides

1B: October 8

Examples, basic terms, and approaches. Special guest: Dr. Stuart Dunn, King’s College London.

Required readings

Lecture slides; see also this video, which contains the interviews you saw in class

Lab one, October 10

What are the components of the digital final project? Project management overview.

Week Two: Selecting, Sorting, Classifying

Key terms: classification, archive, metadata, n-dimensional space, controlled vocabulary

2A: October 13

How do we decide which information is relevant to a topic and which we can ignore? How do we decide how to divide up this information? What are the implications of these decisions?

Required readings

Lecture slides

2B: October 15

What is metadata? Why do we use metadata standards?

Required reading

  • Anne Gilliland, “Setting the Stage,” from Murtha Baca, ed., Introduction to Metadata (Los Angeles: Getty, 2008)
  • National Information Standards Organization, “What is Metadata?” (Bethesda, MD: NISO Press, 2004)

Lecture slides and notes

Lab two, October 17

DEADLINE TO DROP CLASS

Divide into groups, brainstorm topics, buy server space, install Omeka.

Week Three: Classification, Continued; Research Techniques

Key terms: ontology, local knowledge

3A: October 20

What are the ideological effects of various systems of classification?

Required reading

Lecture slides and notes

3B: October 22 | Advanced Research Techniques with Dr. Zoe Borovsky

Required reading
UC Libraries Research Tutorial

Lab three, October 24

Tour of Omeka, discussion of group roles, discussion of one-pager and group charter.

Week Four: From Data to Database

Key terms: database, relational database, data visualization

4A: October 27

Database fundamentals

Required readings:

  • Stephen Ramsay,  “Databases,” in Companion to Digital Humanities, edited by Susan Schreibman, Ray Siemens, and John Unsworth (Oxford: Blackwell Publishing Professional, 2004)
  • David M. Kroenke and David J. Auer, Database Concepts (Upper Saddle River, N.J.: Pearson Prentice Hall, 2008), chapters one and two
  • Emory University, Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database

Slides and notes

4B: October 29

Databases, continued; introduction to data visualization

Required readings:

Slides

Lab four, October 31

Data visualization techniques

Week Five: Information Visualization, Continued; Text Analysis

Key terms: data, capta, parameterization, unstructured data

5A: November 3

Historicizing and theorizing data visualization

Required reading

Slides and notes

5B: November 5

Introduction to text analysis

Required reading

Lecture notes and slides

Lab five, November 7

Text analysis techniques

Week Six: Network Analysis

Key terms: network graph, edge, node, bimodal network

6A: November 10 | In-class project work and check-in

6B: November 12 | Lecture by David Shepard

Network analysis

Required reading:

Slides

Lab six, November 14

Project check-in

Week Seven: Working through Space

Key terms: GIS, Cartesian coordinates, Mercator projection

7A: November 17 | Lecture by Yoh Kawano

Introduction to GIS

Required reading

7B: November 19

What cultural and political values are embedded in the way we model space?

Required reading

  • Ian Gregory, “Using Geographical Information Systems to Explore Space and Time in the Humanities”
  • Sara McLafferty, “Women and GIS: Geosptial Technologies and Feminist Geographies”

Lecture notes and slides

Lab seven, November 21

Working with time and space.

Week Eight: Interfaces

Key terms: interface, materiality

8A: November 24

Interfaces and user experience.

Required reading

8B: November 26

No class

No lab this week

Week Nine: 3D Modeling

Key terms: process-based question, product-based question, immersion, theory, praxis

9A: December 1

3D modeling and cross-cultural interfaces.

Required reading

9B: December 3

Where does theory fit into the digital humanities, and where does praxis fit in? How do we think about the way the two fit together? Wait, what is theory anyway?

Required reading

Lab nine, December 5

Design meetings, project documentation.

Week Ten: Tying Things Up

NO BLOG POST THIS WEEK

10A: December 8

Review session and project workday

10B: December 10

Final exam in class. Questions.

Lab ten, December 12

Finish final projects, prepare for final presentations

Friday, December 19, 11:30 a.m.–2:30 p.m.

Presentations of final projects