The Digital Humanities minor is intended to provide students with literacy in creating, interpreting, and applying the technologies of the digital world. It examines the cultural and social impact of new technologies and enables students to harness these technologies to develop their own research projects in a wide range of fields.
 

Learning Outcomes:

1. Critically evaluate data, information systems, and data structures, as well as primary and secondary sources
2. Apply both quantitative and qualitative methods to analyze data
3. Employ computational methods to answer humanistic questions, and employ humanistic interpretive methods and critiques to engage with computation
4. Conceptualize and execute independent and collaborative digital research projects
5. Collaborate effectively with team members, including those in different disciplines
6. Communicate data analysis clearly to both specialist and non-specialist audiences
7. Apply basic principles of accessibility and user experience design to the creation of a digital project
8. Learn current, in-demand technologies, skills, tools, and scripting languages to be better equipped for the 21st-century workplace
9. Use, critique, and build basic digital infrastructures, such as databases and archives, for Humanities disciplines

The learning outcomes for the DH program address each of the core competencies: critical thinking, information literacy, quantitative reasoning, written communication, and oral communication. Critical thinking and information literacy run throughout the program: Digital tools, algorithms, and data are never simply “givens” but rather subject to intense scrutiny: Who made them? For what ends? How are they structured? What assumptions govern how they work? In more advanced courses, students “look under the hood” and begin to modify data and tools (using, for example, APIs and open-source software). Thorough documentation – in the form of project briefs, data critiques, project write-ups, and final websites – accompanies all research and learning. The capstone projects are the culmination of this process and evidence of the ability to use both quantitative and qualitative methods of analysis. Capstones are project-based collaborations and require students to publicly present their projects orally at the end of the year.