historyproef

The rapidly growing archive of early modern texts online presents significant new opportunities and necessities for the ways in which we organize it. Addressing such challenges raises important questions for both skeptics and boosters: Are new methods of organization resulting in virtual but less reliable finding aids? Do pressures of modernization encourage resource-strapped organizers of  [read on...]

Metadata is a cruel mistress. When she has your eye, she’s exhilarating, full of possibilities. When she turns away, or can’t be found, you’re plunged into melancholic despair of hopeless frustration. One current project funded by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation will help map the botanical specimens held at the JSTOR plants database (plants.jstor.org) has  [read on...]

Medieval and early modern manuscripts continue to be made more accessible to scholars through the traditional critical edition. Yet two particular criticisms of this venerated mechanism have echoed throughout the last few decades: 1) editors have challenged the value of canonical editions from a single editorial voice that claims to reflect authorial intent; 2) editors  [read on...]

One of the digital humanities tools that i’ve started to dig into is a web-based tool for transcribing manuscripts. Among the principle aims are to: improve visibility of and connectivity between full-texts transcriptions of manuscripts harness the typically lost work of partial transcriptions done as part of larger research projects provide a central text-editing space  [read on...]