Description. This course offers a hands-on exploration of the nature of texts, of the complexities of transforming and working with historical texts as data; of the practice of editing in a digital environment using historical printed sources, and of issues connected to publication, visualization, interface, reading, and access.

We’ll learn the essentials of digital text editing and encoding, including transcription in XML, using the widely-adopted guidelines of the Text Encoding Initiative (TEI), protocols for collaboration, text processing using XML-based languages like XPath, XSLT and XQuery, and basic techniques for web publishing (XSLT, HTML and CSS). No prior experience with any of this is required or expected (if you have any questions or concerns about this, please contact me at gt2@uw.edu).

Course goals include:

-- introduction to techniques for digitization, digital editing and text processing: including transcription (manual and using OCR tools), text encoding using TEI (an XML vocabulary for the digital encoding of literary, historical and cultural texts) and related XML-based technologies, such as XPath, XSLT, and XQuery; other encoding/digitization techniques and processing options using programming languages like Python.

-- philosophical and critical reflection on the digitization of literary works and historical materials, including original editions: the benefits and pitfalls of digitization. Questions of access, openness, what does and doesn't get digitally preserved; understanding historical texts as data and as items in databases; metadata and cataloguing; the role of search engines and indexing. The role of copyright: remediation and text reuse. The challenges of time: maintaining books, websites.

-- introduction to histories and theories of literary editing and textual scholarship from the Renaissance to today; working with early editions, primary sources and historical documents (including in UW Special Collections); how to define the text of a literary work in light of the history of its editions, variations, and reception; how to develop an editorial apparatus, situating a work in context. 

-- basic introduction to digital publication: platforms for publishing TEI-encoded documents; basics of web-publishing: HTML and CSS, and to how the web works: web-servers, HTTP, etc. The role of XML databases, such as eXist-db or BaseX. Reflection on interface and “reading” in a digital vs. non-digital environment.

-- better understanding of early printed books and the history of print: how printed books were produced, circulated and read; how to study them today, as historical artifacts.

-- introduction to the history, present and future of the public sphere, shaped by print and now the internet; the role of “publication” in the formation of the public sphere; its role mediating between individuals and communities, from groups with like-minded interests to professional networks to national communities and beyond.

-- project-management; collaboration within a small team: working with collaboration tools like Github and Google tools. 

For graduate students in TXTDS 504:

-- practice and training teaching complex materials to undergraduates and experience working with undergraduates as mentors

-- a project that will enrich the graduate student's work towards their home degree; this might be a digital complement to a research paper; an edition of a work that student is working on in a dissertation; or simply a new methodological dimension to their work.

-- the ability to present and articulate a project and original argument in a scholarly professional context

2 additional courses from our list of approved electives. These include any of the core courses above (which may be repeated once). And courses from the following list: