Towards a Theory of Humanistic Computing and How to Teach It

Early in the field’s development, it was argued that to belong in the Digital Humanities (DH) one must know how to ‘build’—to code. Despite this stated focus, little work has addressed the specific computing needs of DH or the best approaches to teaching computing in that context. The grand challenge of DH is the epistemological dissonance between its constituent domains. Modern computing, anchored as it has become in the knowledge-cultures of science and engineering, is built around assumptions and priorities which often oppose those of humanistic inquiry. Correspondingly, there is an argument that to undertake meaningful humanistic work in a digital space, it is necessary to develop a distinct practice of computing which is aligned with humanistic values. What precisely this paradigm of ‘humanistic computing’ entails, however, is not well defined. The aim of this paper is twofold. Using interviews with DH computing instructors to augment limited existing literature, it first looks to understand the specificity of DH computing education—in terms of both key competencies and areas of interest, and the characteristics and challenges of DH students as a learner group. Second, it aims to establish a working definition of humanistic computing. Taken together, these findings will support the development of a computing curriculum tailored to the Digital Humanities.