Introduction to Digital History

Today, historians are increasingly confronted with questions about the use of primary sources. How does one deal with historical primary sources in the Digital Age? What peculiarities present sources, which have been digitized, or which originated in digital form–so-called “born-digital” sources? How do we read them? How do we interpret them? How can they be used in order to construct a historical narrative?
Following the success of a first edition in Bern (2013), this four-day Summer School offers historians (PhD-candidates, graduates students, established historians) the opportunity to acquire the basic principles of data usage in the historical sciences, and benefit from insights gained in other humanities and social sciences disciplines.
The first three days of the Summer School will alternate lectures and workshops. Courses will be held in plenary sessions, whereas workshops take place in smaller groups. Lectures will tackle crucial epistemological or theoretical problems, while workshops allow participants to learn technical skills by working hands-on with historical data on their own personal computer.
On its last day, the Summer School will host a datasprint.