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Type: course
Course Description
- Instructors: Dr. Nadezhda Povroznik
- Event type: Seminar
- Course Contents:
The course focuses on data visualisation in the humanities and approaches it both as a method of research and as a field of open questions. Data visualisations do not simply present information, but also influence what can be seen, how knowledge is produced, and which voices or perspectives are included or omitted. This makes them a critical area of study for the humanities, where interpretation, context, and representation are central. The course introduces students to key topics such as the histories of data visualisation, its role as a cultural practice and form of knowledge production, and the challenges of trust, credibility, and interpretation. Particular attention will be given to critical and counter-data-visualisations that address absence, silence, and marginality. Students will also explore interactive and experimental designs, immersive approaches to cultural data, and strategies for communicating the complexity and modularity of different types of data. Examples from cultural heritage collections, large-scale cultural data, and interdisciplinary research will be used to highlight the possibilities and limitations of visualisation. By considering both successful practices and problematic cases, the course welcomes students to reflect on how visualisations shape meaning and enable interpretation.
Speakers_Moderation_Rules.pdf Listeners_Guidance.pdf Slides_Week_1_15_Oct.pdf
Lecture Notes
- week1-introduction-art-of-making-data-speak
- week2-histories-of-data-visualisation
- week3-visualization-as-cultural-practice-and-form-of-knowledge-production
- week4-effective-visualisations
- week5-no-in-person-or-in-class-attendance
- week6-critical-and-counter-visualization-in-the-humanities
- week7-interactivity-and-experimental-design-in-visualization
- week8-visualising-historical-data
- week9-consolidation-week (no in person or in-class attendance)
- week10-approaches-to-cultural-data-visualization
- week11-visualization-for-interdisciplinary-and-cross-domain-research
- week12-design-strategies-for-complexity-modularity-and-communication-in-humanities-data-visualization
- week13-special-event
- week14-course-wrapping-up-essay-outline
Syllabus
- Week1: Manovich, Lev. ‘What Is Visualization?’
- Introduction (pp. 1-16) + one of the case studies (at the end of each chapter, feel free to pick it up by your choice): Meirelles, Isabel. Design for Information
- Week2: A Brief History of Data Visualization’. Pp. 15-49. In Handbook of Data Visualization
- Chapter “Escaping Flatland” (pp. 185-198) in: A History of Data Visualization and Graphic Communication
- Week3: ‘What Is Knowledge Visualization? Eight Reflections on an Evolving Discipline’. (pp. 13-31). In Knowledge Visualization Currents
- Chapter “Image, Interpretation, and Interface” (pp. 16 – 55) in Johanna Drucker. Graphesis: Visual Forms of Knowledge Production
- Week4: What Is an Effective Knowledge Visualization? Insights from a Review of Seminal Concepts’. (pp. 3-12) In Knowledge Visualization Currents
- Can I Believe What I See? Data Visualization and Trust in the Humanities
- Week5: No reading
- Week6: Data Visualisation Does Political Things
- The Image of Absence: Archival Silence, Data Visualization, and James Hemings
- Week7: Cultural Data Sculpting: Omnidirectional Visualization for Cultural Datasets’. (pp. 199-220) In Knowledge Visualization Currents
- The Fold: Rethinking Interactivity in Data Visualization
- Week8: Cultural Big Data: Nineteenth to Twenty-First Century Panoramic Visualization
- Impresso Text Reuse at Scale. An Interface for the Exploration of Text Reuse Data in Semantically Enriched Historical Newspapers
- Week9: No reading, consolidation week
- Week10:
- Week11:
- Week12:
- Week13: No reading, special event
- Week14: