The 'digital turn' in research and society, i.e. the growing influence of digital technologies, digital research data, methodologies and software (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, The Digital Turn in the Sciences and Humanities, White Paper 2020, DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.4191345), is challenging traditional methods of producing knowledge in the historical sciences and opening up new fields of research and research agendas.

This seminar provides an introduction to digital research methodology and is structured around the presentation and discussion of the stages in the cycle of knowledge production in the historical sciences in the digital age, from defining the line of inquiry to analysing and interpreting the data collected. It aims to give students the basic skills to use digital tools to conduct research and publish results on paper and online.

Each student will carry out a personal project based on a historical research question and using open data from the web. They will learn how to retrieve, store, enrich and analyse these data in order to highlight the characteristics of the object under study and the structures present in the information collected. Due to its practical dimension, the seminar requires the availability of a personal laptop. It includes an introduction to Python, the Swiss army knife of digital methodology (cf. programminghistorian.org), and the use of the GitHub platform to publish analyses and results ( cf. historian.digital).

The language of teaching will be English in order to allow both French and German speaking students to participate. However, participants will be able to ask questions and write their personal contributions in any of the three languages: German, French or English.