Curriculum and Degree Information
Our curriculum introduces students to fundamental principles and methods of the digital humanities and includes specialization in one of three areas: digital textuality, data visualization and mapping, and digital pedagogy.
Interdisciplinary Learning
After the core curriculum, students are encouraged to engage in interdisciplinary study and research by taking advantage of the numerous course offerings in other disciplines at The Graduate Center and at partner schools. Through a number of interdisciplinary certificate programs, students may choose to continue their studies into a formal four-course sequence in an allied field.
The first core course, Introduction to Digital Humanities, will introduce students to the key ideas, theories, and debates in the field, providing them with an understanding of how digital humanities works in an institutional context and an appreciation for the cultural and interpretive issues that surround digital scholarship. The second core course, Methods and Practices, will provide hands-on experience with digital tools, giving students the technical know-how needed to build digital projects. Students will have the opportunity to develop their own digital project in a humanities field of their choice as a final thesis or capstone project.
In addition to these core courses, students will choose courses drawn from three major areas in the digital humanities: Digital Textuality, Data Visualization and Mapping, and Digital Pedagogy. Each area will typically be addressed in three core courses, which will provide students with a thorough understanding not just of the tools that are used in these forms of scholarship, but also of the humanistic goals that underlie them — the recovery and critical analysis of textual evidence, the production of new cartographic forms to reflect new social and political situations, and the use of technology to bring students into an active role in humanistic inquiry. Students will discuss a selection of courses from among these areas with their advisors.
The curriculum also includes three electives, which students may choose to take in either technical fields that are related to their goals as project developers, or humanistic fields that are related to their research interests. These electives will allow students to build deeper understandings of multiple disciplines — technical and humanistic — preparing them for interdisciplinary work.