Issue theme: New Data – New Questions? The Digital History of Central Europe
Deadline for submissions: February 28th, 2021
Contact: stred@mua.cas.cz
Publication languages: Czech, English, German
Journal website: https://www.mua.cas.cz/en/stred-centre-journal-for-interdisciplinary-studies-of-central-europe-in-the-19th-and-20th-centuries-323
Full text of the journal: www.ceeol.com
Abstracts: http://cejsh.icm.edu.pl
Indexing: ERIH+, SCOPUS, CEEEOL, CEJSH, EBSCO
Technological advances in the digitization of data and computer processing have not only transformed the technical and natural sciences, but are also increasingly used in the humanities. In addition to making existing analog data accessible, digitization and virtual presentation platforms create new data files that are tailored to the needs of the latest research topics and goals. The possibilities of the quantitative and qualitative processing of large volumes of data, visualization, and data modelling have not only changed how we work today, but have also created new epistemological prospects and research perspectives that are revolutionizing these academic fields.
Digital history approaches are starting to be applied to historiography as well. These methods include the digitization of original historical sources in libraries, archives, or museums and making them accessible to researchers through internet platforms, and connecting digital data collection and processing with new research questions and methodologies that were previously impossible. Cliometrics in economic history has been a field with a longer tradition pursuing these approaches, however, we still do not know the extent of the possibilities of the digitization, computerization, and processing of large data files in other historical subdisciplines.
This issue of Střed | Centre will discuss the localization and role of digital humanities and digital history and how they can open up new topics for investigation and formulate new research questions. We are looking for papers that reflect the epistemological possibilities of the various methods used in digital humanities and digital history and analytically apply them on topics from modern Central European history. Are digital approaches a harbinger of a fundamental change in the humanities or a mere tool to help historians streamline existing approaches that is unlikely to result in a paradigm shift? The issue will include the following topics:
- Partial digitization projects with a presentation of analytical outputs
- Interdisciplinarization and using digital data sources across the humanities
- Conservative and digital approaches to resource hoarding
- The (dis)continuity of using information technology in humanities research
- Digital humanities and spatial turn
- Humanities and cyberspace research
