The Elusive Digital / Critical Synthesis

Abstract

In the first Debates in the Digital Humanities, Alan Liu argued that digital humanists risk losing a seat at the “table of debate” if they continue to emphasize tools and databases to the exclusion of cultural criticism. We want to remind the field how difficult it is to achieve the digital/critical synthesis. Liu’s challenge is a more wicked problem than we want to admit, particularly in the context of computational work.