Digital Humanities

History and Development

Olivier Le Deuff

• Publisher: Wiley-ISTE
• Year: 2018
• Print ISBN: 9781786300164
• eBook ISBN: 9781119308171
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Computer Science
• Subtopic: Information Technology
• Index: Computer Science

Where do the digital humanities really come from? Are they really news? What are the theoretical and technical influences that participate in this scientific field that arouses interest and questions? This book tries to show and explain the main theories and methods that have allowed their current constitution. The aim of the book is to propose a new way to understand the history of digital humanities in a broader perspective than the classic history with the project of Robert Busa. The short digital humanities perspective neglects lots of actors and disciplines. The book tries to show the importance of other fields than humanities computing like scientometry, infometry, econometry, mathematical linguistics, geography and documentation.

1
The Republics of Letters: the Need to Communicate and Exchange

The scholar’s need to be able to communicate and pool different work is chief among the key features that recur in the history of digital humanities. If these aspects have become evident thanks to the Web, we need to re-examine the different paths that have led to the constitution of places of knowledge and scientific sharing well before discussion lists and open archives. That is the purpose of the “Mapping the Republic of Letters” project of the University of Stanford¹. However, we must be wary of the temptation of diffusionism, which is to visualize information flow without taking the real impact of reading and the role of readers into account, which is what Sandro Landi [LAN 06] denounced in particular. Diffusionism also ignores the fact that those communicating do not stay in the same place all their lives, which inevitably has an impact on representations. If we take the example of Pierre Bayle (1647–1706), a fixed representation of his correspondence network is of limited interest, as it must be accompanied with the geographical network of a dynamic representation that takes chronology into account. The idea of networks of exchange between researchers is then not as new as social networks of research might make them out to be. In fact, Willard McCarty had created Humanist, a diffusion list, as a kind of electronic seminar. However, he is not the first to have thought of a community for exchanges.

The creation of the Republic of Letters represents a form of pre-digital humanities. These knowledge communities were built on the logic of knowledge flow through printed material as well as handwritten notes and exchange of letters. Annie Barnes described this community as follows:

“The Republic of Letters was made of men of letters and intellectuals of all countries. Note that intellectuals had a role larger than that of poets and that the Republic of Intellectuals, as it was known in Germany, was a more accurate term. It was a state that was strongly democratic, in which birth had no part and only knowledge placed each citizen in his appropriate rank. Differences of nationality as well as religion was effaced… It had a language which was international: Latin – and later French. The first duty of each citizen was to serve ‘les lettres’ and the best way to do so was to participate in a system of exchanges. This was accomplished by a vast correspondence which covered the entire continent, and which formed the actual link between citizens of this ideal Republic… Books and precious manuscripts were also exchanged” [BAR 38, pp. 13–14].

This description demonstrates the richness of a community that was too often reduced to the 17th and 18th Centuries. Françoise Waquet [WAQ 89] showed that the expression is more ancient and that the concept of letters – litterae – must also be investigated, which refers to those who are interested in arts and science. Men of letters are men of science.

1.1. Republic of Letters

The Republic of Letters was often reduced to its important scholars, but it constitutes more than just a simple European network of great scholars and was of interest to amateur researchers and minor scholars [FER 14a]. While it is true that the network was primarily European, it was limited in that sense.

The Republic of Letters was as much a republic of scholars as it was of letters, and it brought together scholars not only in terms of those who could read and write, that is in the Kantian sense of savants [KAN 84], but also as men of letters, as they corresponded via letters. Letters are thus “a vehicle of scientific information”. It should be noted that networks of correspondence are correlated to societies, that is the salons which are not always easy to enter or where it is not always easy to put on a good show.

Candice Delisle outlines the core values of the community of savants:

“This is built around four values that are common, at least in ideals, to present-day science: integritas, perfect honesty, not hiding the truth, not saying anything false; acquitas, the capacity to judge in a fair manner; liberalitas, agreeing to share knowledge and information; and finally, fides, good faith, loyalty and being trustworthy. These four values are often mentioned in the letters exchanged. Thus, declarations of friendships abound and attributes are added to the correspondent’s name. Bonus, eruditus, liberalis, etc. show that a true friend must also have moral and intellectual qualities that are characteristic of the good scholar. In particular, he must know how to be generous” [DEL 06, p. 36].

These are the values that helped evolve one of the most important scholars of the Republic of Letters, Marin Mersenne (1588–1648), who served as its unofficial secretary². Mersenne was a priest of the Order of Minims, who later taught philosophy and mathematics, and was a great scholar in his time. As he was initially a defender of orthodox Christianity, his early writings firmly condemned new and heretical thoughts, before exchanges and the desire to access knowledge took over. Mersenne played a crucial role in the emergence of collectiveness in scholarly practices that were primarily individual. For this, his network of correspondence helped develop a virtual community through the submission of challenges and questions. The exchange of letters that Mersenne received went beyond just questions and challenges and ended up creating a network that would not stop growing.

Mersenne greatly contributed to studying the works of Galileo (1564–1642), even though he dwelled on the scientific character of the savant, greatly minimizing his systematic and philosophical thinking, which was felt to be too heterodox and considered too risky to expose. Although it is hard to know what Mersenne’s position truly was regarding heliocentrism, which he condemned in his writings, the priest made the choice of setting the acceptance conditions of a new science with his network of correspondence. If we wish to make a metaphor, Mersenne’s network of correspondence was clearly a new system in which he finally chose to play a modest, but crucial, role revolving his system around authors who were like the sun to him, shedding the light of future science: Galileo and René Descartes (1596–1650).

Galileo and René Descartes are hard-to-understand personalities, who lived somewhat hidden in comparison to the institution, and whose ego was such that they did not seek to clearly relate to others to the point that they cited very little of the work that preceded them and which contributed to their thoughts. In this, Mersenne is often seen as the mediator. The contemporary practice was to write biographies, curriculum vitae that would ensure that the reputation of the person and the author survived their death. It was the same with Descartes’ biography by Adrien Baillet (1649–1706), and that of Nicolas-Claude Fabri de Peiresc (1580–1637) by Gassendi (1592–1655). The objective was to both show the lives of the savants as an example, and ensure that they were not forgotten, and their work and contributions not lost.

Peiresc represents the sponsor scholar, not as a funder, but mostly as a protector of scholars, which earned him the title of “prince of the Republic of Letters” by Pierre Bayle [BAY 20, pp. 2216–2217]. A prince who was able to organize collective and collaborative work, which made him as much of a scholar as a simple humanist [CHE 11a]. He asked his network of correspondents to observe the lunar eclipse on August 27, 1635, with a telescope. It was in this way that the eclipse was observed at the same time at Digne, Aix, Padua, Rome, Naples, Cairo and Aleppo. His objective was to verify that by observing phenomena at the same time from different places, it was possible to calculate longitudes:

“The result of this noteworthy group work was reducing the eastern side of the Mediterranean by a thousand kilometers. So, what was it that Peiresc and his team, consisting mainly of clerics, managed to do here? Quite simply to correct the map of the Mediterranean in use since the time of Ptolemy. Research hypothesis, team work, observations, and analysis of results made it possible to correct information developed by a ‘prominent figure’ of antiquity” [CHE 11a, p. 698].

Gradually, the scientist who emerged was less and less isolated and no longer an instrument of reputation of monarchs [BUR 15b], but an instrument of his own reputation through his publications. The savant thus became autonomous, meaning that he was not necessarily in the service of his employer, but in the service of the most important and biggest causes, which were above national disputes. In this regard, the savant became detached from national and religious imperatives.

This quest for the truth did not stop the pursuit of recognition that became a driving force in the networks of correspondence, since seeing one’s works being read and shared made it possible to enhance one’s reputation at the international level. However, the process of adhering to a collective spirit evolved a willingness to detach personal interests in science:

“The socialization process of detachment that had begun in the 18th Century to distance scholars first from family and friends and then from contemporaries and compatriots, in the 19th Century eventually estranged them from themselves as well. An eminently psychological process was thereby enlisted to eliminate all that was ‘merely’ psychological and it ultimately forged that peculiar identification of scientific objectivity with the invisibility of the scientist” [DAS 91, p. 383].

This rationale was also apparent through the desire to connect friends and thus create networks. In this context, humanist Conrad Gesner, who had a lot of exchanges with several collaborators, must once again be cited. He corresponded with hundreds of humanists, and also with professionals from various fields such as gardeners, ranchers, hunters and miners. He used a particular document to keep a record of his relationships, making his friends sign his Liber amicorum. 224 people signed it. Gesner specifies the biographical details of each person in his record [LED 15]. It was also a way of thanking them later for his works, as Gesner needed to collect as much information as possible for works, and also on plants and animals, which could not have been possible without the help of a network of collaborators. Science could not be based on one person; from then on, only networks of researchers could help make progress.

1.2. The role of journals and the beginning of scientific information

Established by the Denis de Sallo, the Journal des savants was a 12-page quarto published weekly that mentioned “what is new in the Republic of Letters”, through extracts from recent books, memoirs of scholars and even relationships on jurisprudence [VIT 05, p. 182].

Then came the article, which slowly built itself around the works of Pierre Bayle and his news about the Republic of Letters. In fact, the article constituted an extract or a numbered passage with a title generally in italics. The term ‘article’ only truly began to take root after 1700.

These scientific productions were undertaken with royal privilege. However, their success lead to falsifications and unauthorized reproductions outside of the kingdom of France, notably in Holland, where the journal for scholars [BIR 65] was printed by Daniel Elzevier. With the development of Open Access, contemporary scientific editorial problems were regularly discussed, and it was soon forgotten that the issue of having rapid and inexpensive access to scientific productions was in fact an ancient one. Finally, it was understood that even piracy was an assurance of success:

“Ironically, the Journal des savants owed its success to this editorial piracy: the expansion of the commercial network of Dutch booksellers enabled them to directly meet a faraway order as well as supply to German fairs that could redistribute their publications all over Central Europe. The introduction of the journal in the Uppsala University in 1667 marks the first form of this circulation; the result of the second is ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Table of Contents
• Introduction
• 1 The Republics of Letters: the Need to Communicate and Exchange
• 2 The Science of Writings and Documentation
• 3 From Lists to Tables, the Question of Indexing
• 4 The Need to Find Information
• 5 The Researcher’s Workstation and the History of Hypertexts
• 6 The Quantitative Leap: Social Sciences and Statistics
• 7 Automatic Processing: Concordances, Occurrences and Other Interpretation and Visualization Matrices
• 8 Metadata Systems
• 9 The New Metrics: From Scientometrics to Webometrics
• 10 The Map: More than the Territory
• Conclusion: A Steampunk History and an Archaeology of the (New) Media
• Bibliography
• Index
• End User License Agreement