A humanistic approach to datafication

Two case studies: digital and digitized

Abstract

The term datafication has the ability to embrace a series of aspects that span from the field of computer science to social and cultural studies. While the process of datafication (taking aspects of life and turning them into data) is surrounded by a lure of abstraction and neutrality; similarly to other computational processes, datafication reflects cultural biases, flaws, and implications that affect knowledge and knowledge production. This article explores datafication as related to the semantic web, web ontologies, and other systems of classification as both method and structure of art historical analysis. By analyzing two digital repositories that run on MediaWiki, the goal of this investigation is to incentivize a model that, under the umbrella of digital art history, unifies aspects pertaining to digital curatorship and digital preservation. The two case studies are: The History of Early American Landscape Design (HEALD) and The Educational Encyclopedia of Digital Arts (EduEDA).