The emerging digital infrastructure for research in the humanities

Abstract

This article advances the thesis that three decades of investments by national and international funders, combined with those of scholars, technologists, librarians, archivists, and their institutions, have resulted in a digital infrastructure in the humanities that is now capable of supporting end-to-end research workflows. The article refers to key developments in the epigraphy and paleography of the premodern period. It draws primarily on work in classical studies but also highlights related work in the adjacent disciplines of Egyptology, ancient Near East studies, and medieval studies. The argument makes a case that much has been achieved but it does not declare “mission accomplished.” The capabilities of the infrastructure remain unevenly distributed within and across disciplines, institutions, and regions. Moreover, the components, including the links between steps in the workflow, are generally far from user-friendly and seamless in operation. Because further refinements and additional capacities are still much needed, the article concludes with a discussion of key priorities for future work.

Recommended 3D Workflow for Digital Heritage Practices

“…Two recently published activity processes or research workflows caught our attention, and we take them as a source of inspiration because the first one is concerned with semantic interoperability aspects in an archival context [6] and the second heuristic is rather a generic workflow in the Humanities [7]. Both things are very close to what we do at the Digital Humanities Lab of the University of Basel where we have as much a digitization service for cultural heritage institutions as academic objectives.…”

“…Data Analysis and exploration: qualitative and/or quantitative analysis, query building, data visualization, etc. With Waters [7], the focus is on an academic publication process and on outputs that are not necessarily intended to be manipulated via SPARQL for Linked Data or via RESTful application programming interfaces (APIs). Rather than activities, he outlines six functions (Collect, Catalog, Transcribe/Translate, Identify, Analyze/Interpret, and Publish) and gives examples of either tools or standards for each function within a research workflow (see Figure 1).…”

“…Another critical difference with [6] is also in the transcription approach, which is a separate post-cataloguing step inside Waters' workflow. [7] In Table 1 hereafter, we have attempted to align the two heuristics with our components by taking the approach of Fafalios et al for the digitization and transcription part while adding a long-term preservation component. Regarding the data integration, considering that we would like to be able to export the metadata in different outputs (Linked Data or not), we create a data dissemination component that includes two functions of Fafalios et al (Documentation / Metadata Recording as well as Data Integration), which is somewhat equivalent to Waters' Catalog.…”

“…Within this pipeline, there are two main components which are Cook that automates the processing of the jobs (e.g., format conversion, meshing, texture, etc.) either through a Web user interface or an API as well as Voyager that is used for creating context around 3D objects and for quality control 7 . One of the very important features of the Smithsonian Cook is that reverse engineering is also possible to recreate derivatives or create new ones from master files according to new techniques or recommendations.…”

“…There are many commercial and institutional platforms and 3D web viewers to publish 3D models online 9 . Champion and Rahaman surveyed in 2020 comparing commercials with 9 For an up-to-date overview of the major commercial online platforms, see Frey on All3DP: https://all3dp.com/1/free-3d-models-download-best-sites-3d-archive-3d 8 https://openrefine.org/ 7 Voyager is also the name of their 3D viewer. 6 https://smithsonian.github.io/dpo-cook/…”