Porsdam’s article raised an interesting point, one that I have not considered much. How do we balance the need for more scientific methods and the values of the humanities? I had only briefly heard of Snow and Leavis before this article and I don’t think I really appreciated at the time the importance of their debate. Obviously, the bridging of the gap between the ‘two cultures’ is crucial to the development of digital history.

Again, a new example of one recurring theme of the class is present in the readings. In this gap-bridging, there is a focus on the “process rather than the finished product” in history. This methodological transparency was mentioned in the Gibbs and Owens reading as well, but the risk of wide engagement of the general untrained public in history needs to be tempered with the training of traditional historical academia. The problem with this is that, as Porsdam states, “the humanities have come to be seen today as out of touch with life outside the walls of the university. This has in turn led to an attempt to move more students into vocational training in order that higher education may be reserved for more elitist-minded students.”

A bridging of this gap may involve redefining the humanities through a vocational filter. As humanistic research becomes more digitized, there may be a more blue-collar (or maybe ‘less-elitist’ is a good enough way to say it) association with the humanites. The trick then, I think, is the balancing of elitist-associated academic methods and training with the less-elitist and more general-interest public’s engagement. Stated differently, the problem, perhaps, is less about balancing the current methods of the humanities and the sciences and more about altering how we view these two cultures.