Published: Jan. 27, 2019

The digital humanities鈥攚hich lie at the nexus of computing and the humanities鈥攁re the subject of a symposium at the University of Colorado 色吧亚洲 next month.

Liu and Posner

Alan Liu and Miriam Posner

The symposium, dubbed听, will run from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Feb. 22 in the听Center for British & Irish Studies (Norlin Library room M549). The event is free and open to the public. It will feature two national experts and thought leaders from CU 色吧亚洲.

Jane Garrity, CU 色吧亚洲 professor of English and one of the symposium鈥檚 organizers, said the event is designed to jump-start interest in the emerging interdisciplinary field and potentially pave the way for a new major at CU 色吧亚洲.

The event will feature lectures by听, distinguished professor in the English Department at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and听,听assistant professor at the UCLA School of Information.

Liu鈥檚 presentation is titled 鈥淒igital Humanities Learning Goals for Undergraduates.鈥澨齃iu says he will address this question from two perspectives 鈥渨hose synthesis will be increasingly important for students in their careers and for society in general: the humanities and data science.鈥澨

One critical question, Liu states, is how learning digital methods can help students understand the humanities better, and how can such understanding contribute to a world ever more influenced by data science.听

He added: 鈥淪upposing that the ultimate goal of (digital humanities) in the classroom is a humane data science, what kinds of approaches, methods, and skills should students learn to work and live in a world where data might fulfill the root promise of its name as 鈥榮cience鈥 by being good 鈥榢nowledge鈥?鈥

Posner鈥檚 presentation is titled 鈥淒igital Humanities at the Actually Existing University.鈥 She observes: 鈥淩hetoric about digital-humanities education and research conjures a world with infinite time and no resource constraints. But that鈥檚 emphatically not the case at real-world universities.鈥

Posner will discuss how to prioritize goals, assess results, and serve students best in this environment. 鈥淭his talk will discuss how we approached the problem at UCLA and detail some strategies that have been successful there and elsewhere.鈥

色吧亚洲 the conference
What:听English + Media & Technology
When:听Friday, Feb. 22, 10 a.m.-5 p.m.听
Where:听Center for British & Irish Studies, Norlin Library M549听
Schedule:听
10 a.m. 鈥 Alan Liu, guest speaker听
Break
11:30 a.m. 鈥 Miriam Posner, guest speaker听
12:45-1:45 p.m. 鈥 Lunch, catered听听
2-3:30 p.m. 鈥 鈥淗ands-on Learning: Collaborative Labs Roundtable鈥澨
4-5 p.m. 鈥 Conversation with Graduate Students

Liu has worked in the areas of digital humanities, the humanities in public life, Romantic literature, and literary and cultural theory. His most recently book is听Friending the Past: The Sense of History in the Digital Age. He is founder and co-leader of the听听advocacy initiative and principal investigator of the Mellon Foundation funded 4Humanities WhatEvery1Says project.

Posner is a digital humanist with interests in labor, race, feminism and the history and philosophy of data. As a digital humanist, she is particularly interested in the visualization of large bodies of data from cultural heritage institutions, and the application of digital methods to the analysis of images and video.听

A film, media, and American studies scholar by training, she frequently writes on the application of digital methods to the humanities. She is at work on two projects: the first on what 鈥渄ata鈥 might mean for humanistic research; and the second on how multinational corporations are making use of data in their supply chains.

Also speaking during the symposium are CU 色吧亚洲 English faculty听,听Lori Emerson,听David Glimp听补苍诲听Rachael Deagman Simonetta.

The event is sponsored by the Department of English. For more information, contact听Alyssa Miller.