Professional Skills Workshop: Digital History

What does the digital shift mean for historians? This workshop explores some of the key methodological questions historians encounter when we start using digital tools to answer historical questions. It will also provide training in using digital source materials.

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Participants are welcomed to join a workshop led by the National Library in Oslo who will provide a look into their own digital collection that holds archival material from the medieval until today. Introductory lectures will discuss some of the ethical, historical and methodological key issues in Digital Humanities (DH).

  • What opportunities and problems arise with the digitalization of sources? How do tools and programs affect the questions historians ask? Is there anything in the algorithms that make some knowledge or some analyses unintelligible or opaque?
  • We will also historicize the phenomenon. What is the history of Digital Humanities? Who were the actors that brought us here? Could it have been different? Should it?
  • Furthermore, are there any particular ethical issues that arise or become more acute when historical materials are digitized?

NB: This workshop is an integrated part of the PhD course Theory, Methods and Research Ethics in History, but it can also be done separately. Participation at both the workshop and the course grants 5 + 1 ECTS.

Programme:

  • 09:15: Jens-Morten Hanssen, Welcome and Introduction
  • 09:30: Eivind Røssaak, «The Archive in Motion»
  • 10:00: Ruth Hemstad, «Scandinavianism and the Rhetoric of Scandinavianness in the Nineteenth Century»
  • 10:30: Coffee break
  • 11:00: Lars Bagøien Johnsen, «The Bibliographical Structure of Books about Norwegian History: A Network Analysis of Citations»
  • 11:30: Lars Magne Tungland, “Should Historians Code?”
  • 12:00: Lunch break
  • 13:00: Yngvil Beyer, «Handwritten Text Recognition at the National Library»
  • 13:30: Jon Tønnessen, “The Norwegian Web Archive as an Asset in Historical Research”
  • 14:00: Conclusion
  • 14:15: Benedicte Gamborg Briså, Guided Tour in the Map Centre

Information about participation:

  • This is a workshop for phd-candidates and supervisors.
  • Credit: The course is estimated to 1 ECTS. Students may take the course for credit or audit it. To achieve the credit, PhD-students are expected to submit a 1-2 page long (400-800 words, excl. references) reflection note on either 1) the use of digital sources in their own PhD-project 2) one or several of the questions above. The text is to be submitted no later than 21 March. The grading will be pass/fail.

Deadlines and Application form: 

  • To sign up, please use the application form. Deadline for application is February 6. After the deadline, we accept candidates on a “first come, first served basis’.
  • The course is open for everyone who write a thesis in history or use historical materials/perspectives. Students from partner institutions will have priority.

Questions can be sent to: 

Ada Elisabeth Nissen, a.e.nissen@iakh.uio.no, with a copy to

Oliver Reiersen oliver.reiersen@iakh.uio.no 

 

Partner institutions of the Norwegian Research School in History are:

Strategic Partner:

 

 

 

 

Published May 23, 2022 11:16 AM - Last modified Feb. 17, 2023 1:17 PM