This spring, World History Center leadership and associates will participate in “Data Ethics Across the Disciplines,” a discussion series hosted by the University of Pittsburgh Library System, Digital Scholarship Services. The series aims to explore questions about ethical concerned related to data collection and data-sharing while also connecting researchers from different disciplines who deal with similar data-issues.
On February 23 at 12:00PM, WHC Director Ruth Mostern will participate in the panel “Global Perspectives on Ethical Data Management.” This interactive discussion will explore the benefits and challenges inherent to multi-institutional and international projects that represent diverse disciplinary and cultural data practices. Presenters will address what it means to take a global cultural approach to data ethics, given the nature of working with data produced by different communities and navigating the complex landscape of international policies and cultural expectations.
Jesse Obert, WHC Postdoctoral Fellow in Digital World History, will participate in a panel discussion on March 4 at 12:00PM about “Community-centered Ethics for Digital Cultural Heritage Materials.” Jesse will speak to his work with Greek material culture held outside of Greece in European and American museums, considering the absence of the Greek voice during the ongoing digitization of those materials as well as the ways in which European colonialism continues to exclude Greeks from their own cultural heritage, especially in the digital space.
WHC Associate Director Raja Adal will join a conversation about “Truth versus Authenticity” on March 22 at 12:00PM. This interactive conversation will explore ethical questions related to the digital representation of texts. Raja Adal will speak to ethical questions as they relate to text encoding practices and consider how we might incorporate an ethical lens when working with other types of historical text data.
The Center's participation in the "Data Ethics Across the Disciplines" series reflects it's ongoing interest in data ethics and data practices in diverse disciplinary and cultural contexts. The Center will host it's own discussion about data ethics on March 18 with a discussion of the book The Dangerous Art of Text Mining by Jo Guldi. The Dangerous Art of Text Mining celebrates the bold new research now possible because of text mining: the art of counting words over time. However, this book also presents a warning: without help from the humanities, data science can distort the past and lead to perilous errors. Learn more and RSVP here! The book is available to read online here.