The globalized rhetoric surrounding digital transformation often translates into presumptions of universalization within the field of digital history, which is then discussed in a generic sense, as if it were established on common ground. This correlates with history itself, which developed as a modern discipline in the nineteenth century under the pretense of the universalization of time and historical methods. One should notice, however, that the conditions in which forms of knowledge develop depend on multiple factors of a cultural, political, and economic nature, as has been well debated by multiple facets of anti-colonial thought, for example. When dealing with a field such as digital history, which has developed so closely attached to the need for digital infrastructure, computational skills, and innovation, one should notice that inequality plays a major role in preventing ubiquity on a global scale.
„Ian Kisil Marino: Digital History from the Margins? Latin American Perspectives on an Emerging Field“ weiterlesenGerben Zaagsma: Facing the History Machine: Why Histories of Digital History Matter
With the advent of AI in the last few years, historians are grappling with the question of how these new tools will affect historical knowledge production. Yet questioning the impact of new technologies on the profession is hardly new. For decades, historians have raised fundamental epistemological and methodological questions when confronted with new technologies, yet this is often forgotten in favor of a rhetoric of radical newness and future promises. Recent scholarship is beginning to change this, however. As the praxeological turn in the history of the humanities and historiography has taken hold over the past two decades, scholars have begun to investigate the role of technology in the creation of historical knowledge.[1] More recently, the history of digital history has emerged as a new avenue of research.[2] Nonetheless, the strongest interest in the history of digital history manifests in the history of the humanities and the history of knowledge, and not in the field itself.
„Gerben Zaagsma: Facing the History Machine: Why Histories of Digital History Matter“ weiterlesen
Sebastian Kawanami-Breu, Johan Malmstedt: The Similarity Engine. Steps Towards a Media History of Vector Modeling
Our project revolves around the historical epistemology of vector space models, which we attempt to situate within a larger history of the human quest to measure, quantify, and analyze “similarity”. Starting with current applications and classic works such as Salton’s definition of vector models (Salton 1975, 1989), we will explore the technological history of similarity, the media, and the epistemic practices that gave rise to these models.
„Sebastian Kawanami-Breu, Johan Malmstedt: The Similarity Engine. Steps Towards a Media History of Vector Modeling“ weiterlesen