The Problem of Citation in the Digital Humanities

Jonathan BlaneyInstitute of Historical Research

Sheffield Digital Humanities Congress, 7-9-2012

http://youtu.be/cWhh9Xubwe4

“...if we also learn to live by the golden rule, which Jesus Christ taught us: Love thy neighbour as thyself.”

http://youtu.be/cWhh9Xubwe44’25”-4’34”

Matthew 19.19 Matthew 23.39

Mark 12.31-33 Luke 10.27

www.biblicalstudies.org.uk/pdf/uniqueness_sanders.pdf

TIDSRToolkit for the Impact of Digitised Scholarly

Resources

http://digitisation.jiscinvolve.org/wp/2009/05/18/you-can-now-measure-the-impact-of-your-online-resource/

Aggregate results for 2008-9

• Scopus 37• Google Scholar 43• Common to both 9• Page views 31,367,021

“Is there any way of obtaining accurate page numbers for parts of

the sources? Although the whole site is fantastic for research, it makes

citation very difficult”

“If a book is available in more than one format, cite the version you consulted. For books consulted online list a URL...”

http://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/tools_citationguide.html

Citations are too long.

What’s the point? Isn’t it like citing which library I got the

book from?

Opacity

100 years’ time

PRO, E/135/2/57, ff. 47v-8

MS Vitellius A.XV, f.132

“I am trying to find the source of ‘Trans. Hist. Soc. (NewSer.), xiv,

241’”

2001.10482003/24262006.690.4

“Even a brief exercise in comparison reveals a staggering range of divergent practices under

history’s apparently stable surface.”

Anthony Grafton, The Footnote: A Curious History, Faber and Faber, 1997, p7

“Like the diplomas on a dentist’s wall, footnotes prove that historians are ‘good enough’

practitioners to be consulted and recommended.”

Ibid, p22

Past and Present History Workshop JournalGender and HistoryEconomic History Review History

Social History Contemporary British HistoryEnglish Historical Review

Historical Research Cold War HistoryTwentieth Century British History

Northern History

www.british-history.ac.uk/VCH/Oxon15/Clanfield-religious

VCH Oxon, volume 15, p.139

www.british-history.ac.uk/VCH/Oxon15/Clanfeild-religious

VCH Oxon, volume 15, p.139

VCH Oxon, volume 5, p.139VCH Oxon, volume 15,

p.319

http://www.royal.gov.uk/ImagesandBroadcasts/TheQueensChristmasBroadcasts/ChristmasBroadcasts/ChristmasBroadcast1989.aspx

jonathan.blaney@sas.ac.uk

IHR Digital www.history.ac.uk/digital & @ihr_history

Reports, using TIDSR: http://sas-space.sas.ac.uk/2819/ http://sas-space.sas.ac.uk/2957/