Humanities and data science

How far can data science and the humanities help to answer each other’s questions?

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Status

Ongoing
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Research areas

Social data science Linguistics Ethics Research methods Social networks Artificial intelligence Machine learning Natural language processing

Introduction

Humanities and Data Science logoThanks to digitisation efforts over the past decades, humanities scholars now have access to large digital data collections which can be analysed computationally and quantitatively. Such datasets offer a huge range of opportunities to develop new approaches to answer research questions, from the practical to the high-profile.

Aims

The Humanities and Data Science group has been strengthening relationships and building collaborations at the intersection between data science and digital humanities since its creation in 2017. Raising the profile of data-driven humanities research at the national level and within the Turing, the group nourishes interdisciplinarity and promotes collaborations that not only seek research excellence but also strengthen links with national institutions and organisations, universities and The Alan Turing Institute.

 

The synergy between humanities and data science becomes more important than ever before for tackling modern challenges brought by technological advances and AI and ensuring that such advancements are grounded in ethical and human-centred perspectives. By sustaining a constructive dialogue between the humanities and the sciences through the ongoing development of the group, we demonstrate how data science research can answer questions relevant to the humanities and vice versa, thus benefiting both fields. Stimulated

by the prominence of the Alan Turing Institute, the group achieves its aims through

a series of meetings, workshops, and joint research projects.

 

Recognizing that translating fundamental data science research into lasting impact within the humanities requires interdisciplinary efforts, the interest group leverages the organisers' extensive experience in a wide range of disciplines. It fosters the sharing of diverse perspectives, methods, and knowledge by bringing together experts from digital humanities, historical data research, information, computer science, natural language processing, and other relevant disciplines.   

 

 

 

Talking points

Past working groups

Discussing new topics in the humanities and data science

The Humanities & Data Science Discussion Group aimed at fostering networking across the humanities community and supporting cross-discipline discussions. The organisers (Federico Nanni, Leontien Talboom, Katie McDonough and Malvika Sharan) ran this event online on a monthly basis during the pandemic. The discussion group had an average of 20 participants, 50% of them from external institutions and generally 4-5 of them from international institutes and it covered a large variety of topics, moving beyond specific DH areas to reach out to the broad research community: the role of authorship, the concept of ground truth, open source journalism, ethical implication of archiving social media, current and future role of preprints and commercial organisations doing the job of libraries/archives.

Teaching

This group is composed of members who are involved in delivering and supporting digital humanities teaching and training whether through standalone courses and degree programs or as part of a broader research skills training program across different degrees. An increasing number of institutions are offering teaching provision in the digital humanities, though we recognise that this has reached differing levels of maturity in different locations.

The aim of the sub-group is to provide a forum for the exchange and discussion of the practical and theoretical challenges including institutional barriers related to DH teaching. In particular, we are interested in exploring the following:

  • How to develop good practice in DH teaching, continuing to uphold high pedagogical standards and pursuing innovative teaching approaches that keep pace with the research and technological advances in our discipline
  • How to address institutional challenges that arise from the often fragmentary nature of DH teaching provision, such as liaising across faculties, providing relevant courses for a range of subjects and study levels, and retaining skilled staff
  • How to coordinate efforts across training offerings in order to foster complementarity and address existing gaps

We draw on group members' varied experiences of supporting teaching at their institutions to identify successful strategies. We propose regular face-to-face events for colleagues to discuss and debate these issues and promote broader networking.

Chair: Anne Alexander (Cambridge)

Members: Bea Alex (Edinburgh), Anne Alexander (Cambridge), Giovanni Colavizza (Turing), James Cummings (Newcastle), Rachele De Felice (UCL), Fiona Douglas (Leeds), Leif Isaksen (Exeter), Ewan Jones (Cambridge), Anouk Lang (Edinburgh), Nora McGregor (BL), Thierry Poibeau (ENS), Pip Willcox (National Archives)

Digital humanities Data Study Groups

This working group organised the Turing Data Study Group on Discovering topics and trends in the UK Government Web Archive, with The National Archives as challenge owner , 9-13 December, 2019, The Alan Turing Institute.

Data science and digital humanities white paper

The group collaboratively edited white paper “The challenges and prospects of the intersection of Humanities and Data Science” also presented at the Digital Humanities Congress 2022 which has received substantial attention, including Barbara McGillivray’s interview with the Economist. The white paper is available as:

McGillivray, Barbara et al. (2020). The challenges and prospects of the intersection of humanities and data science: A white paper from The Alan Turing Institute. Figshare. dx.doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.12732164

How to get involved

We welcome new members to the group. There are two main ways to be involved in the group: members and affiliates.

Members. Members act as delegates from their institution, in a two-way mechanism for intelligence/knowledge exchange about institutional activity and disseminating Turing activities. These meetings are an opportunity to discuss group-internal matters and to decide on the focus areas for the group. We ask members to attend at least half of the group meetings in a year (and send apologies to the chair for those they can’t attend), to volunteer to chair some of the meetings and to follow up on specific actions arising from the discussion.  The group organises member meetings every second Thursday of the month, from 11 to 12:30, remotely via Zoom. If your institution already has a member, please contact them (see list below). If your institution doesn’t yet have a member and you have enough time and commitment, you are welcome to join the group as a member by contacting the group convenors ([email protected]). We understand that circumstances can change, so we ask members to confirm their interest at the beginning of every calendar year.

Affiliates

We keep affiliates updated on the main activities of the group via our mailing list, which anyone is welcome to join. Affiliates are also welcome to join one of the group’s working groups (see above for more information) by contacting the respective chair. If you can’t join as a member but you’re interested in joining as an affiliate, please contact the group convenors ([email protected]).

 

Recent updates

 

Previous events

Towards Large Scale Cultural Analytics in the Arts and Humanities

Turing H&DS were partners in the "Towards Large Scale Cultural Analytics in the Arts and Humanities” AHRC funded project [AH/W007533/1], as part of the Scoping Future Arts & Humanities Led Research programme (also known as AHRC iDAH).”

Organisers

Contact info

Please subscribe to our mailing list for updates.

If you are interested in the group, please contact the convenors at the following address: humanitiesanddatascienceconvenors AT turing DOT ac DOT uk

Convenors

Barbara McGillivray, King's College London
Andreas Vlachidis, UCL

Members

Beatrice Alex, University of Edinburgh

Anne Alexander, University of Cambridge

Marc Alexander, University of Glasgow

Dora Alexopoulou, University of Cambridge 

Sarah Ames, National Library of Scotland

Emmanouil Benetos, Queen Mary University of London

Gabriel Bodard, School of Advanced Study, University of London

James Cummings, Newcastle University

David De Roure, University of Oxford

James Freeman, University of Bristol

Megan Gooch, University of Oxford

Eirini Goudarouli, The National Archives UK

Giulia Grisot, University of Manchester

Alexandra Karamitrou, University of Southampton

Andrea Kocsis, University of Edinburgh

Nicola Osborne, University of Edinburgh

Yipeng Qin, Cardiff University

Mia Ridge, British Library

Charalampos Saitis, Queen Mary University of London

Rachel Saunders, University of Nottingham

Fraser Sturt, University of Southampton

Joanna Taylor, University of Manchester

Melissa Terras, University of Edinburgh 

Charlotte Tupman, University of Exeter

Cassie Ulph, University of Leeds

Ioannis Votsis, Northeastern University London

Daniel Wilson, The Alan Turing Institute

Elizabeth Williamson, University of Exeter

Jane Winters, School of Advanced Study, University of London

Resources

Humanities and Data Science Turing Interest Group – annual update summer 2019

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External events

  • What is the role of the Arts and Humanities in the age of Data Science?
    Wednesday 5 September 2018, 18:00-20:30 BST, Edinburgh, UK
    Find out more