Regarding the argument in the DH community over whether or not humanities students should learn to code, I think that humanities students should learn how to code. However, I do not believe that they should have to know anything more than the basics. As Kirschenbaum says,” It used to be that we in English departments were fond of saying there was nothing outside of the text. Increasingly, though, texts take the form of worlds as much as words. Worlds are emerging as the consummate genre of the new century, whether it’s the virtual worlds of Second Life or World of Warcraft or the more specialized venues seen in high-end simulation and visualization environments. Virtual worlds will be to the new century what cinema was to the last one and the novel to the century before that.” I think that because the worlds are emerging, humanities students should be familiar with basic coding practices. Anything outside of that can be an easy google search. This is my opinion as a statistics student who codes in R for most homework assignments. Outside of statistics homework, I have taken one computer science class and wasn’t the biggest fan. I think that knowing the basics of coding has been very useful to me, even though I don’t plan on taking another computer science class. Being in my computer science class has helped me learn how to problem solve in ways that learning other things haven’t. For example, I am more able to solve small problems because of how often I had to debug code. Now, I am also better at using my resources. My peers also agree they learned vital skills in our computer class as well. Often in my computer science class, my professor has told me to find solutions to my coding errors through ChatGPT before going to office hours. This resulted in my homework being done much quicker and I have carried this skill into my other classes. For example, in this class when I am experiencing trouble, the first thing I now do is try to google solution. This is usually very effective. In conclusion, humanities students should learn how to code. Even if it is the basics such as “Hello World” shown below. Even learning the basics of coding has been proven to help students with skills in life that aren’t necessarily learned in regular humanities classes.
print("Hello World")
"Hello World"
3 thoughts on “Blog Week 3”
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I agree that humanities students should learn basic coding skills as well because the evolving digital world. I like how you tied your own experience as a statistics student and your experience in computer science. I come from a similar background but understand computer science basics are crucial to know. I am glad to hear that your coding class helped you enhance your problem-solving skills.
I definitely agree that humanities students should have to learn the basics of coding. I think it can really help grow your problem solving skills and help with a new way of thinking. The quote you selected is interesting, and shows how fast the digital world is developing. Coding has lots of applications that could be useful even in the humanities.
I think, too, I am interested in seeing the future of our expanding digital worlds and how that will affect digital and real-world creativity. I wonder how expanses of media and movies will be transformed or, if, for example, a fantasy book has a map in it, what are the possibilities of creating online interfaces to interact with books?!