20.246 are we healthy?

               Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 20, No. 246.
       Centre for Computing in the Humanities, King's College London
  www.kcl.ac.uk/schools/humanities/cch/research/publications/humanist.html
                        www.princeton.edu/humanist/
                     Submit to: humanist_at_princeton.edu

         Date: Tue, 10 Oct 2006 06:36:05 +0100
         From: Matthew Jockers <mjockers_at_stanford.edu>
         Subject: Health of Digital Hum?

Forgive me for re-asking a sort of perennial question, but I was
wondering lately about the general health of the Humanities
Computing/Digital Humanities discipline/community. Things certainly
seem to be strong and recent news, such as that sent this week from
Willard announcing the phd in Digital H, from King's College, would
appear to be strong indicators of a growing appreciation/need for
computing humanists.

That said, my observations are rather anecdotal; I wonder if any of
you has the specific numbers to support my suspicion that things are
healthy. For example,

How is membership in ACH/ALLC/ADHO? Are we a growing organization?

And what about new university programs in the US. I know of
Nebraska's recent investment, and there are the old stalwart programs
at UVa, Mith, and etc., but where are the MA's, the PhD's? It looks
like Iath's MA program is "on hold."

Matt Kirshenbaum's December 2005 Blog entry is very useful, of
course, (http://www.otal.umd.edu/~mgk/blog/archives/000869.html) as
are the comments to follow. And the list of "Institutional Models"
at the ADHO site http://www.allc.org/imhc/ is very encouraging
overall but at the same time rather light in terms of degree granting
programs, especially in the US.

The view from here (in the heart of the Silicon Valley) is, well,
foggy. We recently began offering Stanford undergraduates enrolled in
our Interdisciplinary Studies program the opportunity to get an
"emphasis" in Digital Humanities. Similar "emphases" options have
been proposed in several humanities departments across campus and
though things are moving along, I think that even in 2006 there is
still a great deal of confusion about how computing and, say literary
studies, can coexist.

I ask none of this with any eye toward stirring the pot, or towards
renewed discussion of whether we are or are not a discipline etc.,
I'm really just curious to know, as quantitatively as possible the
health/state of things.

Matt

-- 
Matthew L. Jockers
Stanford University