Julianne Nyhan Andrew Flinn Towards an Oral History of Digital Humanities

288 Pages·2016·3.08 MB·English

Springer Series on Cultural Computing
Julianne Nyhan
Andrew Flinn
Computation
and the
Humanities
Towards an Oral History
of Digital Humanities
Springer Series on Cultural Computing
Editor-in-Chief
Ernest Edmonds, University of Technology, Sydney, Australia
Editorial Board
Frieder Nake, University of Bremen, Bremen, Germany
Nick Bryan-Kinns, Queen Mary University of London, London, UK
Linda Candy, University of Technology, Sydney, Australia
David England, Liverpool John Moores University, Liverpool, UK
Andrew Hugill, De Montfort University, Leicester, UK
Shigeki Amitani, Adobe Systems Inc., Tokyo, Japan
Doug Riecken, Columbia University, New York, USA
Jonas Lowgren, Linköping University, Norrköping, Sweden
More information about this series at http://www.springer.com/series/10481
Julianne Nyhan • Andrew Flinn
Computation and the
Humanities
Towards an Oral History of Digital
Humanities
Julianne Nyhan Andrew Flinn
Department of Information Studies Department of Information Studies
University College London (UCL) University College London (UCL)
London, UK London, UK
ISSN 2195-9056 ISSN 2195-9064 (electronic)
Springer Series on Cultural Computing
ISBN 978-3-319-20169-6 ISBN 978-3-319-20170-2 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-20170-2
Library of Congress Control Number: 2016942045
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I ndil-chuimhne ar Barry O Flynn
(1974–2001) agus ar Patrick Flinn
(1927–2016)
Acknowledgements
We are grateful to the following organisations for funding the research that under-
pinned this book: Das Historisch-Kulturwissenschaftliche Forschungszentrum
(HKFZ), University of Trier, Germany; the European Association for Digital
Humanities (EADH); the UCL Centre for Digital Humanities (UCLDH); and the
Department of Information Studies, UCL.
UCL’s open access office generously provided the funding that has enabled the
book to be published under an open access licence.
Thank you also to Helen Desmond of Springer UK for her expertise and seem-
ingly endless reserves of patience. Our Research Assistant, Jessica Salmon, made
the initial transcriptions of most of the interviews included in this book. She did this
with her characteristic conscientiousness, care and good humour and we are very
grateful to her. When there was a short break in our funding John Nyhan was gener-
ous enough to humour his daughter’s selfless attempts to find him a retirement proj-
ect. He valiantly transcribed two interviews before more funding, and his freedom,
was restored. Thank you also to him and Eileen Nyhan for stepping in on babysit-
ting duties and allowing some of the interviews that were held outside of the UK to
take place.
We are grateful to the numerous members of the Digital Humanities community
(writ large) who have agreed to be interviewed during the course of this research. A
selection of those interviews are contained in this book; full details of all those
whom we interviewed are available on our project webpages: http://hiddenhistories.
omeka.net/interviews. Thank you for your time, generosity, openness and the care
you showed when responding to the volley of interview transcripts that were, and in
some cases continue to be, sent your way.
A number of colleagues have encouraged and supported this work in various
ways. Joseph Raben, who died on 18 January 2015, aged 90, sent encouragement,
documentation, comments and corrections. He made a pivotal contribution to devel-
opment of Digital Humanities and it is fitting that he is so present in this book even
though it was not possible for us to interview him. Roy Wisbey kindly shared other-
wise inaccessible documents related to the founding of the ALLC. Helen Agüera
shared useful and otherwise difficult to access documents with us. Wilhelm Ott and
vii
viii Acknowledgements
Susan Hockey both allowed Nyhan to spend time perusing their personal archives
and libraries. Marco Passarotti gave Nyhan much assistance during her visit to the
archive of Fr Roberto Busa S.J. in Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Milan. As
ever, Melissa Terras has not only been a brilliant friend and colleague but also a
source of much inspiration. Willard McCarty encouraged this work in all sorts of
ways, from sending information about useful publications, acting as a sounding
board for early plans about the shape this book might take and carrying out, on our
behalf, the interview with Hugh Craig and John Burrows when we could not make
it to Australia. Steve Jones has been very kind with his time and expertise and gener-
ously shared drafts of work in progress. Geoffrey Rockwell shared drafts of work in
progress, details of connections he has made with those who worked in DH in its
earliest stages and copies of sources that are otherwise difficult, if not impossible to
access. He has given tremendous and much appreciated help. Like that of Jones and
McCarty, Rockwell’s work on the history of DH has been crucially important for us.
Thank you also to James Cronin, Claudine Moulin, Ulrich Tiedau and the many
colleagues and friends with whom we have had helpful discussions about this work.
Most of all, thank you to our families without whom none of this would be pos-
sible. Finally a special mention to Patrick Flinn, beloved father, who passed away
just as this book was being completed.
Contents
1 Introduction ............................................................................................. 1
Introduction to Digital Humanities ........................................................... 1
Humanities Computing (c.1949–2006) ..................................................... 2
DH (c.2006–Present) ................................................................................. 4
Is DH a Discipline? ................................................................................... 6
The State of the Art: Histories of DH ....................................................... 8
Why Do We Not Have Histories of DH? .................................................. 10
The Approach Taken in This Book ........................................................... 11
Why Do We Need Histories of DH? ......................................................... 14
References ................................................................................................. 16
2 Why Oral History? ................................................................................. 21
Introduction ............................................................................................... 21
A Brief History of Modern Oral History .................................................. 23
Challenges to Oral History: Valuing Difference ....................................... 26
Studying Communities.............................................................................. 29
A Conclusion. Oral History and Communities:
To Whom Does This History Belong? ...................................................... 33
References ................................................................................................. 34
3 Individuation Is There in All the Different
Strata: John Burrows, Hugh Craig
and Willard McCarty ............................................................................. 37
Biographies ............................................................................................... 38
Interview ................................................................................................... 39
References ................................................................................................. 53
ix
x Contents
4 The University Was Still Taking Account of
universitas scientiarum: Wilhelm Ott and Julianne Nyhan ................. 55
Biography .................................................................................................. 55
Interview ................................................................................................... 56
References ................................................................................................. 72
5 hic Rhodus, hic salta: Tito Orlandi and Julianne Nyhan ..................... 75
Biography .................................................................................................. 75
Interview ................................................................................................... 76
References ................................................................................................. 85
6 They Took a Chance: Susan Hockey and Julianne Nyhan .................. 87
Biography .................................................................................................. 87
Interview ................................................................................................... 88
References ................................................................................................. 97
7 The Influence of Algorithmic Thinking: Judy
Malloy and Julianne Nyhan ................................................................... 99
Biography .................................................................................................. 99
Interview ................................................................................................... 100
References ................................................................................................. 120
8 I Would Think of Myself as Sitting Inside
the Computer: Mary Dee Harris and Julianne Nyhan ........................ 123
Biography .................................................................................................. 123
Interview ................................................................................................... 124
References ................................................................................................. 136
9 There Had to Be a Better Way: John Nitti
and Julianne Nyhan ................................................................................ 137
Biography .................................................................................................. 137
Interview ................................................................................................... 138
References ................................................................................................. 156
10 It’s a Little Mind-Boggling: Helen Agüera
and Julianne Nyhan ................................................................................ 157
Biography .................................................................................................. 157
Interview ................................................................................................... 158
References ................................................................................................. 166
11 I Heard About the Arrival of the Computer:
Hans Rutimann and Julianne Nyhan .................................................... 167
Biography .................................................................................................. 167
Interview ................................................................................................... 168
References ................................................................................................. 175