1. What is DH, and why does it matter?
Have you taken the DH Profile Quiz?
http://tinyurl.com/dmdhquiz

2. Defining DH
• By when it began (1946, approximately: date of
Roberto Busa’s plan for the CodexThomisticus)
• Its stability, or lack thereof
• Its self-consciously mutable and multimodal nature
• According to its friction with traditional a.k.a.
analog humanities

3. What others say
“...I like to say that digital humanities is just one
method for doing humanistic enquiry.”
--Brian Croxall, Emory University
“A term of tactical convenience.”
--Matthew Kirschenbaum, U of Maryland
“I think digital humanities is an unfortunate
neologism, largely because the humanities itself is
a problematic term.”
--Trevor Owens, Library of Congress
“I don’t. I’m sick of trying to define it. When forced
to, I’ll make the referent the people instead of the
ideas or methods -- Digital Humanities is the thing
practiced by people who self-identify as Digital
Humanists. It’s helpful to have a name for the field
chiefly for institutional authority. Though granted I
think it does involve coding/making/building/doing
things with computers, things related to, you know,
the humanities.”
--Amanda French, Center for History and New
Media

4. Values behind DH

5. Goals: what we can do
• Provide necessary background and vocabulary via
these workshops and the DMDH website.
• Make the digital humanities a safer, less intimidating,
and more welcoming space for experimenting.
• Allow you to begin charting your own course, and
developing your own projects.
• Build a DH cohort at UW.

6. Limits: what we can’t do
CAN BECOME
A DIGITAL HUMANIST

7. But don’t worry...

9. Websites for Evaluation
Old Bailey Online : http://www.oldbaileyonline.org/
DHPoco - Rewriting Wikipedia Project : http://dhpoco.org/rewriting-wikipedia/
The Homer Multitext Project : http://www.homermultitext.org/
TranscribeBentham : http://blogs.ucl.ac.uk/transcribe-bentham/
UVic Maker Lab in the Humanities: http://maker.uvic.ca/
www.twitter.com/feministhulk
www.twitter.com/autoblake
http://tinyurl.com/fycchat2 and http://fycchat.blogspot.com

10. Website Evaluation Questions
What do you see as the project teams’ priorities?
Which DH values do you see in operation?
What sort of usage (and user) is being posited?
What aspects (if any) aren’t working well?
Is there anything else that stands out, or raises questions
for you?

11. Flash Project Development
Brainstorm a DH project with your team!
(Students at Cabrini College brainstorm a DH project on porn. Image c/o Adeline Koh.)

12. Will it focus on one distinct topic? Or on
bringing multiple topics together?
What artefacts will it contain, or collect?
How will users interact
and/or contribute?
What forms (modes) will it take?
Flash Project Brainstorming
What perspectives do you want it to explore?

13. Resources for further training and
collaboration
DMDH (http://www.dmdh.org)
HASTAC (http://www.hastac.org)
DHSI (http://www.dhsi.org)
TEI Seminars at Brown University
(http://www.wwp.brown.edu/outreach/seminars/)
UW Libraries Workshops (http://www.washington.edu/lst/workshops)
Profhacker (http://chronicle.com/blogs/profhacker/)
Online coding courses: Skillcrush
(http://www.skillcrush.com) and Codecademy
(http://www.codecademy.com), many others (just google!)
Digital Humanities on Twitter -- no account needed
(https://twitter.com/paigecmorgan/digital-humanities)

14. With thanks to our sponsors...
Faculty sponsors: Tyler Fox, Ann Lally, Brian Reed, Miceal Vaughan,
Stacy Waters, Helene Williams

15. Works Cited
The quotes in the slide “What others say”
were taken from the essay “Day of DH,” in
Debates in the Digital Humanities, edited by
Matthew K. Gold, and published by the
University of Minnesota Press in 2012.
Thanks to Adeline Koh for permission to
use the image in Slide 11.