William Blake and the Digital Humanities: Collaboration, Participation, and Social Media

220 Pages·2012·2.044 MB·English

by  Roger Whitson, Jason Whittaker

William Blake and the Digital Humanities
William Blake’s work demonstrates two tendencies that are central to
social media: collaboration and participation. Not only does Blake cite and
adapt the work of earlier authors and visual artists, but also contemporary
authors, musicians, and fi lmmakers feel compelled to use Blake in their own
creative acts. This book identifi es and examines Blake’s work as a social
and participatory network, a phenomenon we describe as zoamorphosis,
which encourages—even demands—that others take up Blake’s creative
mission. The authors reexamine the history of the digital humanities in
relation to the study and dissemination of Blake’s work: from alternatives
to traditional forms of archiving embodied by Blake’s citation on Twitter
and Blakean remixes on YouTube, smartmobs using Blake’s name as an
inspiration to protest the 2004 Republican National Convention, and stu-
dents crowdsourcing reading and instruction in digital classrooms to better
understand and participate in Blake’s world. The book also includes a con-
sideration of Blakean motifs that have created artistic networks in music,
literature, and fi lm in the twentieth and the twenty-fi rst centuries, showing
how Blake is an exemplar for understanding creativity in the digital age.
Roger Whitson is an Assistant Professor of Nineteenth-Century British Lit-
erature and the Digital Humanities at Washington State University, US.
Jason Whittaker is Professor of Blake Studies at University College Fal-
mouth, UK.
Routledge Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Literature
1 Environmental Criticism for the 9 Wallace Stevens and Pre-
Twenty-First Century Socratic Philosophy
Edited by Stephanie LeMenager, Metaphysics and the Play of
Teresa Shewry, and Ken Hiltner Violence
Daniel Tompsett
2 Theoretical Perspectives on
Human Rights and Literature 10 Modern Orthodoxies
Elizabeth Swanson Goldberg Judaic Imaginative Journeys of the
and Alexandra Schultheis Moore Twentieth Century
Lisa Mulman
3 Resistance to Science in
Contemporary American Poetry 11 Eugenics, Literature, and
Bryan Walpert Culture in Post-war Britain
Clare Hanson
4 Magic, Science, and Empire in
Postcolonial Literature 12 Postcolonial Readings of Music
The Alchemical Literary in World Literature
Imagination Turning Empire on Its Ear
Kathleen J. Renk Cameron Fae Bushnell
5 The Black Female Body in 13 Stanley Cavell, Literature, and
American Literature and Art Film
Performing Identity The Idea of America
Caroline A. Brown Edited by Andrew Taylor
and Áine Kelly
6 Narratives of Migration and
Displacement in Dominican 14 William Blake and the Digital
Literature Humanities
Danny Méndez Collaboration, Participation, and
Social Media
7 The Cinema and the Origins of Roger Whitson and
Literary Modernism Jason Whittaker
Andrew Shail
8 The Gothic in Contemporary
Literature and Popular Culture
Pop Goth
Edited by Justin D. Edwards and
Agnieszka Soltysik Monnet
William Blake and the Digital
Humanities
Collaboration, Participation, and Social Media
Roger Whitson and Jason Whittaker
NEW YORK LONDON
First published 2013
by Routledge
711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017
Simultaneously published in the UK
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group,
an informa business
© 2013 Taylor & Francis
The right of Roger Whitson and Jason Whittaker to be identified as
authors of this work has been asserted by them in accordance with sections
77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or
utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now
known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in
any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing
from the publishers.
Trademark Notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or
registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation
without intent to infringe.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Whitson, Roger.
William Blake and the digital humanities : collaboration, participation,
and social media / by Roger Whitson and Jason Whittaker.
p. cm. — (Routledge interdisciplinary perspectives on literature ; 14)
Includes bibliographical references.
1. Blake, William, 1757–1827—Influence. 2. Blake, William, 1757–
1827—Criticism and interpretation. I. Whittaker, Jason, 1969–
II. Title.
PR4148.I52W46 2012
821'.7—dc23
2012031927
ISBN13: 978-0-415-65618-4 (hbk)
ISBN13: 978-0-203-07806-8 (ebk)
Typeset in Sabon
by IBT Global.
Contents
List of Figures vii
Acknowledgments ix
Introduction: Zoamorphosis and the Digital Humanities 1
1 Archives and Ecologies 26
2 The Tyger 52
3 Jerusalem 72
4 Digital Creativity: Teaching William Blake in the Twenty-First
Century 91
5 Blake and His Online Audiences 115
6 Folksonomies and Machine Editing: William Blake’s New
Aesthetic on Flickr, Wikipedia, and YouTube 138
Coda: Dust and Self-Annihilation 164
Notes 179
Bibliography 189
Index 205
Figures
I.1 Graham Harwood. London.pl. 16
4.1 Alex Oxford. Binded with Briars. 107
4.2 Charles Hancock. My Deities Are So Obscure, I’m Basically
Their Biggest Fan. 110
4.3 Charles Hancock. Urizen Is God, Now Los Is God. 111
4.4 Charles Hancock. Derp. 112
5.1 Weekly citations of six Romantic poets over a twenty-seven-
week period. 121
6.1 Screenshot from Jonah. 138
6.2 Screenshot from Jonah. 138
6.3 Screenshot from Jonah. 138
6.4 Screenshot from Jonah. 138
6.5 William Daniels. William Blake II. 149
6.6 Karen Tregaskin. Eternity in a Grain of Sand. 153
Acknowledgments
ROGER
Books are layered by networks of ghosts whose labor disappears in the form-
ing of words, paragraphs, transitions, and citations. I’d fi rst and foremost
like to thank Jason for taking a chance on a young scholar and being so
enthusiastic when I approached him about coauthoring a book. Donald Ault
has, and remains, an inspiration for my work on William Blake. I would
have never looked at the later prophecies without his visionary guidance
and his iconoclastic approach to literary study. Robert Early’s fascination
with The Book of Urizen sparked my interest in reading Blake more closely.
Conversations with Ron Broglio, Tristanne Connolly, Jim Rovira, Mark
Douglas, Walter Reed, Colin Trodd, and Mark Lussier helped form many of
the ideas surrounding zoamorphosis. Richard Burt has remained an impor-
tant mentor for me and kept me focused on fi nishing my fi rst book.
The book would have been impossible without the life-changing experi-
ences I gained during my tenures in the Writing and Communication pro-
gram at Georgia Tech (2009–11) and the Digital Scholarship Commons at
Emory University (2011–12). The thinking behind multimodal composition
from Tech’s Brittain Fellowship was foundational in my pedagogical exper-
iments in Chapter 4. I learned especially from Rebecca Burnett, L. Andrew
Cooper, Crystal Lake, Andrea Wood, Nirmal Trivedi, Melanie Kohnen,
Andrew Famiglietti, Robert Blaskiewicz, Leigh Dillard, Matt Paproth, Jen-
nifer Parrott, Robin Wharton, Diane Jakacki, Jesse Stommel, Pete Rora-
baugh, Doris Bremm, Regina Martin, Tom Lolis, Michael Rowley, Chris
Ritter, Sarah Schiff , and Rachel Dean-Ruzicka. The Georgia Tech students
in my Spring 2011 “Blake 2.0: William Blake and Digital Culture” and
Walter Reed’s Fall 2010 “William Blake” course at Emory University pro-
vided, quite literally, the material for a substantial portion of the book. My
colleagues at Emory’s Digital Scholarship Commons (DiSC) gave me time
to fi nish the book and insight into digital research. Stewart Varner, Brian
Croxall, Miriam Posner, Scott Turnbull, Ben Ranker, Sari Connard, Tim
Bryson, and Laura Akerman all proved to be instrumental in developing
my work in the digital humanities.
x Acknowledgments
The THATCamp and OOO communities provided a supportive net-
work of scholars and professionals that helped nurture my enthusiasm for
collaboration and speculative philosophy. In particular, I benefi ted from
Bethany Nowviskie, Amanda French, Mark Sample, George Williams,
Erin Templeton, Tonya Howe, Patrick Murray-John, Adeline Koh, Kather-
ine Harris, Kathi Inman Berens, Lori Emerson, Tim Morton, Ian Bogost,
Steven Shaviro, Levi Bryant, and Graham Harman. And I would be remiss
without mentioning my new colleagues at Washington State, whose inter-
ventions helped streamline some of my more extravagant theoretical leaps:
Todd Butler, Jon Hegglund, Kristin Arola, Kirk McAuley, Patricia Erics-
son, Trevor Bond, Donna Campbell, Ben Bunting, and Debbie Lee.
My family has continued to support me as I develop as a scholar and a
person. My mother, Cathy Hodgson; my father, Todd Whitson; and the
other members of my family, Charrie Dixon, Kate Whitson, Ruth Hodg-
son, David Whitson, Elaina Whitson, Aubrey Whitson, Jan Baumgart-
ner, Gary Baumgartner, Donna Hodgson, Chris Hodgson, Scott Struck,
Monica Swink, Harold Swink, Rory Flynn, Elizabeth Flynn, Shawn Flynn,
Hope Crumley, Aimee Moore, Erin Lohbeck, Evan Baumgartner, Chris
Hunter, Anella Hunter, Tina Hunter-Witt, Nathan Witt, Alexander Bear
Witt, Jason Hunter, Shannon Hunter, Leah Hunter, Ethan Hunter, Andrew
Hunter, Charles Hunter, David Hunter, Lucas Hunter, Brent Hunter, Ann
Hunter, Kim Parks, Aaron Parks, Amanda Gogarn, and Jordan Parks. This
book is dedicated to those friends and family members who are no longer
with us, but who continue to impact me: my grandparents, Roger Hodgson,
Mary Whitson, and David Leech Whitson; and my friend Nicole LaRose,
who gabbed with me about Blake, Deleuze, and departmental politics when
we were roommates in graduate school. No doubt, she would have told me
to stop typing away at my computer and start doing something that’s actu-
ally useful. And so I shall.
Most importantly, I wish to thank my fi ancée, Leeann Hunter, and our
kittens, Buddha, Nemo, and Templeton—for giving me a home, a world,
and a life.
JASON
For twenty years now Blake has remained a profound infl uence in my life
and on my work, and there are several scholars who have changed sig-
nifi cantly the ways in which I think and write about him. Steve Clark and
Tristanne Connolly in particular have been excellent sounding boards for
some of my ideas, curbing some of my worst excesses and encouraging
what (I hope) are some of the more adventurous excursions into under-
standing how Blake remains such a vital force. I would also especially like
to thank Keri Davies, who combines impeccable scholarly credentials with
a generosity of learning that always makes receiving any message from him
Acknowledgments xi
a real pleasure. In addition, for the past decade I have followed one line of
thought that has uncovered considerable riches in terms of Blake’s infl u-
ence, and so must express my deepest gratitude to Shirley Dent: it was dur-
ing the summer of 2000 when we fi rst conceived the idea for Radical Blake
that began this particular path, and she has always been one of the most
provocative and entertaining writers on Blake.
Other friends, colleagues, and infl uences remain extremely important.
David Worrall not only gave me great encouragement and support early
on in my career, but also inspired me to think about “global” Blake. Colin
Trodd has produced exceptional work on Blake’s infl uence on later artists
and I was very lucky to be a reader of his manuscript; as will be clear from
reading this book, Mark Lussier and Mike Goode have wrought their own
transformations on my perceptions of Blake. I would also like to thank
Morris Eaves for his encouraging words when fi rst I began writing about
zoamorphosis, and James Rovira for his contributions and enthusiasm.
Some of the practical work that I began on Blake emerged out of a joint
project with Jason Hall, and he and other colleagues from the University
of Exeter, notably Alex Murray and Adeline Johns-Putra, have been both
politely indulgent and courteously critical of my crazier ideas. I would like
to thank them, and also Marion Gibson and Gary Tregidga for giving me
the opportunity to develop some of my ideas on “Jerusalem” in a keynote
for the 2010 conference on Myth, Mysticism and Nationalism, as well as
Masashi Suzuki who, with Steve Clark, invited me to speak at the Digital
Romanticisms conference in the same year. In addition, colleagues at Fal-
mouth—Mark Douglas, Julia Kennedy, Anne Taylor, Hayes Mabweazara,
Kym Martindale, Ruth Heholt, and many others—have been very support-
ive of my work over the years.
I would like to thank my father, Bill, my sister, Rachael, and most of
all my wife, Sam. They more than anyone know what Blake means to me.
Finally, this book is for my mother, Kath: I know she would have read it
immediately (as she read all my books) were she still here today.