Data Science for the Humanities
This course fulfills Quantitative Data Analysis requirement. Over the last decade, humanists have turned to data and to computational methods of data analysis to seek new understandings of literature, history, and culture. This course will provide you with a practical introduction to data-driven inquiry in the humanities, with a focus on the Python programming language. (No prior knowledge of programming is required or expected.) In addition to learning foundational scripting and data science skills, we will ask questions about the role of data in the humanities. What new research questions in the humanities can we investigate using data-driven methods? How can we use humanities methods to reflect on data-driven research practices? And how can we make our conclusions relevant within the larger frame of humanistic inquiry? Course work will include readings, weekly programming exercises, a writing assignment, and a final project.