Digital Humanities is a large umbrella that brings together research, teaching, citizenship, creativity, programming, and public humanities. People come to digital humanities from many perspectives but most share an interdisciplinary and collaborative approach. Digital Humanities is not a panacea for the oft-discussed “crisis in the humanities” but it is an area of learning and study that a responsible College of Humanities or Liberal Arts must address. In the past, we in the humanities have held that we prepare undergraduate students for careers as well as lifetime learning/citizenship through both the study of humanities themes and social issues as well as critical thinking, cultural literacy, and communication skills. These core goals must now encompass digital literacy.
I previously proposed the introduction of a new, interdisciplinary Digital Studies degree along the lines of the Liberal Studies degree at Wright State. Digital Studies would serve students in the STEMM areas as well as those in Liberal Arts, Education, Human Services, and Business. What would a CoLA Digital Humanities certificate or minor look like? First of all, the course of study would serve advanced undergraduate as well as graduate students looking to enhance their MA degrees in the college. The format of courses would vary with many delivered through a combination of online components and webinars. Core courses could include an Introduction to Digital Literacy, Visual Rhetoric, a Digital Humanities Toolkit (a heavily hands on course with a lab), Humanities Research in the Digital Age, and a seminar that looks at issues in digital humanities. Cross-listed seminar or elective course topics might include Cultural Institutions and Informal Learning, Curating Digital Collections, History and New Media, Digital News Media, Participatory Democracy and Social Movements in the Digital Age, Privacy and Identity, Copyright, Digital Project Management, Professional and Technical Writing, Digital Storytelling, Documentary Studies, Crowdsourcing News, Maps and Map Making, Games and Virtual Worlds, Hypertext and Text Mining, and so on.
Courses that meet face-to-face and address relevant themes would also be included. However, a new certificate or degree program should reflect the potential of digital humanities through far greater openness to both student interests and public access. Using the Open Courseware model pioneered at MIT and elsewhere, the content of courses can be made available online for a period of time and some webinars may be open to the public. As well as independent studies, a Digital Humanities program would offer collaborative studies opportunities for groups of students to define their own course of study. One of my best experiences in graduate school in American Studies was a collaborative independent study of photography, over two quarters, with three graduate students and Professor John Modell. We can certainly put our heads together and figure out how to respond to students, encourage collaboration, enrich learning, and compensate faculty fairly for their work in a digital environment.
Margie McLellan