Digital Tools and Methods in Classical Studies Research

General Introduction:

Welcome to Digital Tools and Methods in Classical Studies Research. This course is for students enrolled in an undergraduate degree program in Classical Studies and Ancient History, or for anyone interested the topic of Digital Humanities more generally. Digital Humanities is a rapidly growing area of humanities scholarship. Over the last twenty years or so there has been a rapid increase in the number of open source digital collections of ancient texts, both in their original language and in translation. Similarly, there has been a proliferation of open source digital collections of ancient material culture. These developments have been nothing short of revolutionary for students scholars of Classical Antiquity. In the past, students typically only had access to the ancient texts, scholarly compendia and collections, peer-reviewed journals, and monographs that were available in library holdings of their home institutions. Students who attended the world’s largest and most well-funded institutions thus had a decisive advantage over students enrolled at smaller, more modestly funded universities, whose library holdings and collections were, and are, similarly modest. As for access to objets d’art and other forms of material culture, these traditionally had to be visited either in situ, or else in the major museum collections where they are housed. Such collections are again typically found in major metropolitan areas and are not necessarily easily accessible for students who enrolled at universities that are not as near to major collections of material culture. However, the rapid growth in the aforementioned online repositories has levelled the playing field to a considerable degree. Students no longer find themselves in a position where they must secure funds to cover the expense of travel in order to visit libraries with more extensive holdings, or to see major museum collections or archaeological sites in person.

Yet even though the increase in the number, accessibility, and sophistication of many online collections of ancient texts and objects has tended toward the general democratization of access to knowledge about the ancient world, it has also created certain challenges. Classical studies students have found it necessary to become increasingly tech-savvy, thus adding to the long and growing list of interdisciplinary skills required for modern Classical Studies research. While Classical scholars are not expected to become programmers, they are expected, at the very least, to develop a certain facility with the growing range of digital resources mentioned above, and to have some sense as to how the digitization of primary source material, both textual and material, might change the way we conduct research. The aim of this course is, then, to provide Classical Studies students with a general knowledge of how to conduct otherwise traditional Classical Studies research using openly available digital resources.

This course is highly practical in its aims and has two main areas of focus. The first aim is to familiarize students with traditional sources and methods of Classical Studies research and how to use them competently in order to answer a scholarly research question. This course is above all thus a course in practical methods in Classical Studies research. Unfortunately, courses in general research methods are a rarity in Classical Studies. Most graduates from Classical Studies programs who are of a certain generation remember all too well the frustration of having to learn specific research skills on their own largely through osmosis. More recently, a number of manuals on both general and specialized Classical Studies research methods have appeared,^[1] and this has been a salutary development for the field. Less common are practical works published or courses offered on Classical Studies research methods in specifically digital, online contexts, and this brings us to the second aim of this course, which is to demonstrate, in a hands-on sort of way, the various digital tools available for Classical Studies research and how to use them.

Course Mechanics:

This PressBook is divided into six self-contained modules. The module topics are as follows. Module 1, Formulating a Scholarly Research Question and Conducting a Literature Review, will explore what constitutes an appropriate academic question, as well as how to assemble relevant bibliographical material using digital scholarly compendia, bibliographic databases, online collections of scholarly journals, before exploring strategies for conducting a thorough and effective literature review, which is the starting point for any scholarly study.

Module 2 – Introduction to Digital Collections of Ancient Texts will introduce students to open, online collections of ancient texts in Latin, Greek, and English translations and will provide strategies for how to utilize them effectively.

In Module 3 – Resources for Digital Philology, aside from discussing the role of philology as the backbone of all Classical Studies research, we also examine some digital lexica and word study tools and discuss strategies for using them in order to conduct research of a philological nature.

Module 4 – Digital Epigraphy addresses the role of epigraphy in Classical Studies research before turning to open, digital epigraphic databases with a view to using those databases critically and effectively.

Module 5 – Digital Collections of Material Culture examines the traditional methods for the use of material culture (i.e. art and archaeology) in Classical Studies research, before turning to an exploration of the various digital collections of material culture and how to use them effectively.

Finally, Module 6 – Integrated Historical Databases will introduce students to what we might call ‘meta-engines’ which make use of other digital resources in order to make available a wide array of source materials some rather unique and effective ways. The aim, then, is to provide students both with a knowledge of the traditional working methods of Classical Studies scholars and to equip them with the ability to make use of the digital tools that have been developed to assist with the application of those working methods.

Each module consists of a brief textual introduction to the subject, one or short lecture videos on the module topic, and links to other ancillary videos and/or reading material. Each module concludes with a list of key terms and concepts.