The Humanities in the Digital: Beyond Critical Digital Humanities

The book challenges the current model of knowledge production and argues that the COVID-19 pandemic has exposed its inadequacy. It suggests that the rigid conceptualization in disciplines division and competition is complicit in promoting a narrative that pairs computational methods with exactness and neutrality while stigmatizing consciousness and criticality as carriers of biases and inequality. The author proposes a third way: knowledge creation in the digital through the analysis of personal use cases and applied contexts such as digital heritage practices, digital linguistic injustice, critical digital literacy, and critical digital visualization.

Format: Hardback
Length: 173 pages
Publication date: 21 March 2023
Publisher: Springer International Publishing AG

This open-access book challenges the contemporary relevance of the current model of knowledge production. It argues that the full digitization of society, accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic, has added extreme complexity to the world, conclusively exposing the inadequacy of our current model of knowledge creation. Addressing many of the different ways in which technology has transformed reality, such as the pervasive adoption of big data, the fetishization of algorithms and automation, and the digitalization of education and research, Viola examines how the rigid conceptualization in disciplines division and competition is complicit in promoting a narrative that has paired computational methods with exactness and neutrality while stigmatizing consciousness and criticality as carriers of biases and inequality. Taking the humanities as a focal point, the author retraces schisms in the field between the humanities, the digital humanities, and critical digital humanities; these are embedded within old dichotomies: sciences vs. humanities, digital vs. non-digital, and authentic vs. non-authentic. Through the analysis of personal use cases and exploring a variety of applied contexts such as digital heritage practices, digital linguistic injustice, critical digital literacy, and critical digital visualization, the book shows a third way: knowledge creation in the digital.

This open-access book challenges the contemporary relevance of the current model of knowledge production. It argues that the full digitization of society, accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic, has added extreme complexity to the world, conclusively exposing the inadequacy of our current model of knowledge creation. Addressing many of the different ways in which technology has transformed reality, such as the pervasive adoption of big data, the fetishization of algorithms and automation, and the digitalization of education and research, Viola examines how the rigid conceptualization in disciplines division and competition is complicit in promoting a narrative that has paired computational methods with exactness and neutrality while stigmatizing consciousness and criticality as carriers of biases and inequality. Taking the humanities as a focal point, the author retraces schisms in the field between the humanities, the digital humanities, and critical digital humanities; these are embedded within old dichotomies: sciences vs. humanities, digital vs. non-digital, and authentic vs. non-authentic. Through the analysis of personal use cases and exploring a variety of applied contexts such as digital heritage practices, digital linguistic injustice, critical digital literacy, and critical digital visualization, the book shows a third way: knowledge creation in the digital.

Weight: 393g
Dimension: 210 x 148 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9783031169496
Edition number: 1st ed. 2023