Report from the scientific conference “Digital Humanities in the Nordic Countries” (DHN 2020)
Last week – on October 20-23, 2020 – the Clarin-PL Team had the pleasure to participate in a scientific conference devoted to Digital Humanities in the Nordic Countries.
Digital Humanities, or the implementation of humanities departments in virtual reality, have been flourishing all over the world in recent years. An important element of the dynamic development of any scientific area is the need to integrate the community in order to exchange experience and ways to improve its research workshops. This is especially important when this area of research is complex and interdisciplinary, and this is precisely what Digital Humanities is all about!
Almost one hundred papers were delivered at the conference. It would be impossible to describe them all. However, in order to let you feel at least a bit of its atmosphere, we have selected two studies which, in our opinion, illustrate how interesting the topics in the field of Digital Humanities can be and what problems researchers in this field need to face.
The first was a presentation entitled “A vaccine against fake news”, delivered by Jon Roozenbeek from the University of Cambridge. He talked about news pretending to be real articles, pieces of information, memes, posts on social networks, etc., which are intended to mislead the recipient, as well as about ways to counteract fake news. He obtained the data for analysis through an unconventional combination of psychology and gaming. As a result, a browser game called “Bad News” was created, in which players assume the role of a fake news creator, and then their task is to spread propaganda as much as possible. The results of the study showed that the game acts as a “vaccine”, increasing skepticism about fake news in players by giving people a “low dose” of the methods behind disinformation.
The author of the second paper was Eavan D’Dochartaigh from the Swedish University of Umeå – an Irish woman who is in love with the Arctic. The subject of her research is to revise the common perception of the Arctic as a deserted and frozen place. The data collected by the researcher covers the creativity of local communities living in the western part of the Arctic. These are mainly sketches, paintings, engravings, photographs and lithographs. The project involves the creation of a public repository in which the data in the form of images will be marked on the map of the Arctic. The challenges that Eavan will have to face include determining the names of certain areas of the Arctic (different names for the same place), or tracing the origin of the data (based on available historical knowledge).
Research in the field of Digital Humanities can be very diverse, so everyone can find something for themselves. The next edition of this conference will take place in 2022. You are cordially invited! Perhaps it will be a spark of inspiration for you.
Your Clarin-PL Team