IMC 2019: Sessions

Session 1303: The Dark Side of Digitization: How Virtual Collections Shape Research

Wednesday 3 July 2019, 16.30-18.00

Sponsor:	Special Collections, KU Leuven
Organiser:	Tjamke Snijders, Vakgroep Geschiedenis, Universiteit Gent
Moderator/Chair:	Erika Graham-Goering, Vakgroep Geschiedenis, Universiteit Gent
Paper 1303-a	Creating a Virtual Collection: How Institutional Policies Shape Our Understanding of Medieval Libraries (Language: English) Tjamke Snijders, Vakgroep Geschiedenis, Universiteit Gent Index terms: Computing in Medieval Studies, Manuscripts and Palaeography, Medievalism and Antiquarianism
Paper 1303-b	Lost in Digital Wonderland: Material Culture and Digital Literacy (Language: English) Irene van Renswoude, Huygens ING, Koninklijke Nederlandse Akademie van Wetenschappen, Amsterdam / Faculteit Geesteswetenschappen, Universiteit Utrecht Index terms: Computing in Medieval Studies, Literacy and Orality, Manuscripts and Palaeography, Teaching the Middle Ages
Paper 1303-c	The Digital Miscellany: Fragmentation and Unity in the Online Presentation of a Manuscript - A Case Study (Language: English) Suzette van Haaren, Onderzoekinstituut voor Geschiedenis en Kunstgeschiedenis, Universiteit Utrecht Index terms: Computing in Medieval Studies, Manuscripts and Palaeography
Abstract	Manuscript digitization helps to conserve and disseminate collections while enabling new forms of analysis. There are many successful initiatives: the Bibliotheca Laureshamensis, the Codices Electronici Sangallenses, the Bibliothèque virtuelle du Mont Saint-Michel… Yet digitization also has its dark side: there are issues of representativity (what manuscripts are digitized, and why?), of distortion (to what extent do photographic images reproduce a manuscript?), and of interpretation (what are the hidden assumptions and interpretative models behind quire formulas, dating, and other forms of metadata?). This session seeks to delve deeper on these issues, focusing on the question of how virtual collections shape research.