From: Humanist Subject: Humanist begins its 10th year Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 1 (1) Birthdays and anniversaries seem like "eternal returns", ritual moments that demand reflection on the simultaneous past and future. So I am righteous in my excuse to belabour you with editorial ruminations at the end of Humanist's ninth year and the beginning of its tenth. Humanist began on 7 May 1987 as a consequence of an inspirational moment at a conference of the Association for Computers and the Humanities in Columbia, South Carolina. Its beginning was almost accidental, no more than an attempt to provide continuing conversation for a small group of frustrated individuals who met after hours at the conference to discuss the lack of support for humanities computing and what might be done about it. Philosophical investigations and meditations, as well as exchanges of information, proved more appealing than academic politics, for which we may all be most grateful. Thus the creature we now exercise. What a dismal thing Humanist would have been otherwise! Almost a decade later computing has become nearly universal, although in the humanities its application remains at a primitive level on the whole and, as Mark Olsen has famously pointed out, its effects on the disciplines are not always obvious. It seems to me that John Burrows' counsel to patience, based on the fact that change in scholarship is slow, is right, however. He and many others have shown what can be done by what they have done, and if it takes the rest of us longer, or if some of us choose non-computational methods, so what? The proof is in the pudding, and I smell delicious puddings in several corners of the house. Yes, I know, many are cruelly excluded from the house altogether. How can we use computing to ameliorate the situation? Institutionally, even amidst euphemistical "downsizing" (for this read "getting a bonus for laying off employees"), there are nevertheless hopeful signs. Let me cite just a few with which I have been directly or indirectly involved; I'm sure news of others would be very welcome. One of the hopeful events I have for you affects the near-future of Humanist; this seems a particularly apt moment to tell you about it. First, two recent meetings of considerable significance. One was the annual gathering of the American Council of Learned Societies, in Washington, DC, U.S.A., 25-27 April, where five of us participated in a panel, "Internet-accessible scholarly resources for the humanities and social sciences". The participants were Susan Hockey (Director, CETH, Princeton/Rutgers), Jennifer Trant (Imaging Initiative, Getty Art History Information Program), Charles Henry (Director of Libraries, Vassar), and Richard Rockwell (Executive Director, Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research); I, representing Humanist, was the commentator. What made this event significant was, I think, the fact of its being held at all, at this annual meeting. Such recognition of computing by the ACLS follows just a few months on Humanist becoming its adjunct publication, and a few more months on ACLS President Stan Katz's address at the ACH/ALLC conference in Santa Barbara, at which he identified computing as one of the most important priorities of the academy for the next decade. The second was a special meeting convened last week at the National Humanities Center, in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, U.S.A., to discuss the role computing should have in advanced humanities research, and specifically how the NHC should support its fellows with computing, even to encouraging computing applications. This meeting was divided into seven sessions, following NHC Director Robert Connor's summary of the history and goals of his Center. Five of these sessions consisted of brief presentations based on questions set by Robert Wright, Director of Development; two others were for discussion. 1. Susan Hockey, David Seaman: Advanced technologies, resources, and access 2. Morris Eaves, George Landow, Ann Okerson: Scholarship, publication, and and scholarly publications 3. Jacqueline Brown, Janet Murray: Teaching and curricular applications 4. Larry Friedlander, Institutional, professional, and disciplinary issues 5. Willard McCarty, John Unsworth: The role of colleges and universities, research libraries, professional organizations, and institutes for advanced study Again, the significant fact to my mind was that the NHC would take such trouble to consider the nature of humanities computing before incorporating it into its mission. I expect we will be hearing much more from the NHC later. At the beginning of this message I referred to the original motivation for Humanist, which was to establish humanities computing as a scholarly field. Humanist quickly became international and so took on a much broader purpose. Meanwhile institutions, which are conservative by nature, have been slow to respond, but responses are now visible. Numerous places appear to have worked computing into new academic positions in traditional departments (reports on these would be welcome). In other cases, most notably for N. America at Oberlin College, computer science has adopted the humanities as a major focus. New positions in humanities computing itself have been slower to develop, but there are a few: at Glasgow (Dan Greenstein), at McMaster, in Ontario, Canada (Geoffrey Rockwell), for many years at Groningen, the Netherlands (Harry Gaylord) and at Tuebingen (Wilhelm Ott). Which others have I missed? I am especially happy to announce :-) one other, at King's College London, where I have just been appointed Senior Lecturer in Humanities Computing, in an academic unit known as the Centre for Computing in the Humanities. Although the technical and administrative details of Humanist have yet to be worked out completely, I will be editing Humanist from London, probably as of mid August. In the interim, with help, I trust there will be few interruptions, but I suspect the chaos of a major move will occasionally intrude. Your kind patience will be appreciated. So, on the ninth anniversary of Humanist we may have reason to think that our half-full glass, like the magical wallet of folktale, is slowly filling itself up. As a child I always thought that the number 9 was a threshold, as far as one could go without stepping over into a new cycle. Since I am as good at walking on water as my cats, my personal step over the threshold is a rather large one. (Prolonged study of Milton, some of you will notice, has left its mental mark.) On the verge, my best wishes and warmest regards to fellow Humanists. Happy Birthday! WM From: "Christopher G. Fox" Subject: Request from the Assistant Editor (please post) Date: Tue, 7 May 1996 11:41:51 -0400 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 2 (2) As the summer approaches, many of you might not be checking your e-mail regularly, might be forwarding your mail to other addresses, or might be considering using an automated reply to indicate that you will be unavailable for a certain period of time. Although these three situations present few problems for personal, individual correspondance, they can be quite a headache for listserv administration and automated e-mail distribution. I therefore make the following requests: 1) If you will not be checking your e-mail, and you have a disk quota, please postpone your subscription. Once your disk quota has been exceeded, the messages we send will start being bounced back to us, and we will eventually need to delete your subscription. 2) If you are forwarding your mail to a different address, please remember that you will not be able to post messages or communicate with the ListProcessor from your new address. As far as the list is concerned, you are still subscribed at your regular address, regardless of where the mail ends up going. Anything you send with therefore be automatically rejected. If you would like to post a message or change your subscription parameters in some way, you need to telnet to the account at which you are subscribed and send mail from there. 3) If you set up your e-mail to make an automatic reply to all messages received, we will receive that reply often a dozen or more times a week. All such messages will appear as potential posts to Humanist, and we will have to delete them manually. The automated reply may be useful for individual correspondents, but it causes many problems for list administration. If you are planning to use it, please postpone your subscription. As always, if you have any questions about how to configure your subscription using listproc, that information is available on the Humanist web pages. Please feel free to ask me any questions you might have if your circumstances are not covered by the available instructions. Best wishes for the summer, Christopher G. Fox Assistant Editor--HUMANIST Center for Electronic Texts in the Humanities From: "Gregory J. Murphy" Subject: Humanist Subscription Database Date: Tue, 7 May 1996 18:48:14 -0400 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 3 (3) In response to the many suggestions and complaints which we received, the on-line Humanist subscription database has been redesigned. The database contains contact and biographical information for users who subscribed via the database's WWW interface. At present, there are some 150 records in the database, representing the same number of subscribers. Improvements to the database engine and interface include: - new subscribers may now choose their own password - errors in email addresses are detected directly, before being passed on to listproc. - fields in the database are searched according to their type: character, numeric, or date. - search terms may now include most of the regular expression characters used by grep. Once the new database engine is in full swing, Humanist will accept new subscriptions _only_ via the WWW. Users who wish to join but do not have access to the web may request an email version of the subscription form. The new subscription mechanism may be accessed from the Humanist homepage. We strongly encourage members who have been around longer than the database to resubscribe with more up-to-date information. From: Subject: Re: 9.775 COLLATE? Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 4 (4) & many others... from whom we learn that Peter Robinson, PeterR@vax.ox.ac.uk, is the author of Collate, and information about it may be obtained from the CTI Textual Studies Resource guide at http://info.ox.ac.uk/~ctitext2/resguide/analysis/collate.html Many thanks to all. From: Willard McCarty Subject: impermanence Date: Mon, 6 May 1996 21:36:18 -0400 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 5 (5) Bob Amsler, in Humanist 9.774, puts his virtual finger on a stubborn reality of electronic publication: "The basic philosophical problem of citing the Web is that it is a fundamentally transitory reference." Are we trying our best to ignore this problem because we STILL cannot quite see that the Web is not paper and print? that it has its own intrinsic tendencies which we are silly, or worse, to resist? Let me put the matter another way. Consider all the scholarship we publish that has value for the moment, for six months, a year, five years, but that we would be well rid of. (I am assuming, for purposes of argument, that everything which is published has value for some amount of time, however small.) Would this kind not be better published in "a fundamentally transitory" medium? Perhaps a more interesting question concerns the effects rapid, transitory publication might have on the humanities. What might happen if our research were more conversational, as in the social sciences? How might the academic professions be affected if paper-publication were reserved for material chosen on the basis of its long-term interest? Some years ago I was fortunate to hear a Stanford economist (whose name, alas, I have forgotten) brilliantly address the crisis in scholarly publishing. In essence what he pointed out was that scholarly publishing, as we know it, is an integral part of the academic world, that it cannot simply be changed without profound consequences, and that changes are not going to be easy because the system within which this publishing is integral will resist our efforts. Since our livelihoods and way of life depend on this integral system, should we not be examining the big picture? It seems to me that we must understand the sociology and philosophy of knowledge in order to know what to do with the new medium. Or we can just let others, such as our friends in the infotainment industry, make the decisions for us. Comments? WM Willard McCarty, Univ. of Toronto || Willard.McCarty@utoronto.ca http://www.epas.utoronto.ca:8080/~mccarty/wlm/ From: Peter Graham, Rutgers University Libraries Subject: Re: 9.774 citing Web documents Date: Tue, 7 May 96 10:44:04 EDT X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 6 (6) John Unsworth suggests avoiding the angle brackets on a citation because the sgml- or html- aware program will not know what to do with it. But this is undoubtedly the reason the form suggested by Berners-Lee includes the term URL as the initial element, as in the following citation* to, say, his home page. As has been pointed out, various software tools use the URL forms to highlight them or make automatic links out of them. --pg *http://www.village.virginia.edu/~jmu2m/> Peter Graham psgraham@gandalf.rutgers.edu Rutgers University Libraries 169 College Ave., New Brunswick, NJ 08903 (908)445-5908; fax (908)445-5888 http://aultnis.rutgers.edu/pghome.html> From: Andrew Burday Subject: Re: 9.774 citing Web documents Date: Tue, 7 May 1996 11:23:43 -0400 (EDT) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 7 (7) On Mon, 6 May 1996, Humanist wrote: [deleted quotation] Um, sorry, but this just isn't right. First of all, I'm not sure what you mean by an "html-aware" program. I guess the term is often used to refer to programs with heuristics to pick out URLs, but that's not html. In any case, two related points can be made. First, surely Netscape and other web browsers count as "html-aware". But any properly designed web browser will do what you describe *only* in an html context. A document's content type may be identified by the header sent to it by an http server, or by the extension if it's a local file or if the header doesn't identify it. Any of those mechanisms can create what I'm calling an "html context". If, based on one of those mechanisms, the browser "thinks" it's displaying a plain text file, it will happily display any markup that happens to appear in the file, including angle brackets, and it will not highlight anchors or do anything if you select them. Second, if the program you're using -- mail reader, news reader, or whatever it is -- is ignoring text in angle brackets *outside of an html context*, it is badly designed. All kinds of strings get put in angle brackets, for all kinds of reasons. It is just unreasonable to assume -- outside of an html context -- that every string in angle brackets is an html tag. In other words, outside the context of a document which has (implicitly or explicitly) been declared to be html, the most "html-aware" programs there are will do nothing special with material in angle brackets. That is the most reasonable behavior, outside of an html context. And the question I was originally trying to address was how to identify URLs outside of html contexts. Again, I don't think it's worth trying to adjust our practices to fit whatever the writers of some particular mail or news reader have chosen to code into their software. The point is to have a consistent, standard way to refer to URLs outside the context of html. The software authors should be supporting the standards, not the other way around. [deleted quotation] I appreciate your taking the effort to come up with three counterexamples to your own thesis, so that I don't have to! ;*> Best, Andrew Burday andy@philo.mcgill.ca http://www.philo.mcgill.ca/> From: Subject: Leiden Summer School Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 8 (8) A series of self-contained, 2-day courses at introductory, intermediate and advanced levels. The Leiden Summer School is organized for postgraduate and advanced graduate students in history, professional historians and archivists. The Summer School is organized by the Netherlands Historical Data Archive (NHDA), the Postgraduate Programme for Historical Information Science (Leiden University), Department for Social and Economic History (Leiden University) Leiden Summer School Outline of Courses: June 17-22: Introduction to New Media and Advanced Methods for Historical Research (Doorn and others) This introductory course offers a broad overview of modern information technology for historians, including lectures, demonstrations and hands-on practicals on: the Internet, historical CD-ROMs, optical reading of historical documents, multimedia applications, historical data archiving, and other electronic information resources for historians. June 17-22: Scanning and Optical Character Recognition of Historical Documents (van Horik/Sesink) In this course students will learn to apply scanners for the automatic conversion of historical sources. Attention is paid to image enhancements techniques and formatting of OCR-output. This course is repeated in the second week. June 17-22: Advanced Statistics for Historical Analysis with SPSS-PC (Doorn) The SPSS-PC package is used to explain aspects of log-linear models, multiple regression and time series analysis, using historical data. June 17-22: Historical Databases (Leenarts/De Nijs) This course explores the potential and limitations of databases for the structuring and representation of historical sources, using dBASE (for Windows). June 17-21: Quantitative Approaches to the Colonial History of South-East Asia (Lindblad) This course is about how to apply computer assisted methods to major problems in the economic and social history of colonial South-East Asia (in particular Indonesia), including foreign trade, colonial drain, and coolie labour. June 24-29: Text Analysis I: TACT (Doorn/Leenarts) The TACT system is used in this course for computer assisted textual analysis. Attention is paid to the structuring of historical textual documents using a mark-up language. June 24-29: Text Analysis II: Hypertext, SGML, HTML, TEI (Leenarts/Nauta/Van Kersen) This course pays attention to the importance of the Standard Generalized Markup Language (SGML) for electronic historical texts. The Text Encoding Initiative as an SGML-implementation is explained. It is shown how hypertexts for the World Wide Web can be structured with HTML. June 24-29: Multimedia for Historical Presentations (Luijting) In this course students learn how multimedia can be used to present historical information. The Toolbook authoring system in connection with Visual Basic will be used to prepare a presentation. June 24-29: The History of European Economic Integration: Computer Assisted Research and Electronic Information Resources (Griffiths) In this course computers are used for finding and manipulating data on the history of European integration, broadly described (EEC, EFTA, OECD, GATT). June 24-29: Preparing a Historical Dissertation with WP 6.1 for Windows (in Dutch; Doorn) This course is specifically meant for Dutch post-graduates (AIO/OIO's) who are preparing their dissertation. Many aspects of the lay-out and production of your own book are dealt with. Teaching Staff: Dr. Peter Doorn (NHDA/Leiden University) Prof. Richard Griffiths (Leiden University) Drs. Ren van Horik (NHDA) Drs. Janneke van Kersen (NHDA) Drs. Ellen Leenarts (Leiden University) Dr. Thomas Lindblad (Leiden University) Drs. Marc Luijting (Leiden University) Drs. Gerhard Nauta (Leiden University) Drs. Thimo de Nijs (Leiden University) Drs. Laurents Sesink (NHDA) Drs. Heiko Tjalsma (NHDA) More information considering registration, accomodation, social and cultural events and costs see: http://www.leidenuniv.nl/nhda/education/sum_school.htm or contact: Leiden Summer School c/o NHDA P.O. Box 9515 2300 RA Leiden The Netherlands Fax: +31 71 5272615 Phone: + 31 71 5277040 / 5272742 E-mail: ESF2@stpc.wi.leidenuniv.nl From: orlandi@rmcisadu.let.uniroma1.it Subject: an article on encoding Date: Tue, 7 May 1996 10:56:47 +0100 (BST) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 9 (9) The readers of Humanist might be interested in knowing that I have placed in an html site: http://rmcisadu.let.uniroma1.it/~orlandi/encod.html a contribution (in Italian) entitled: Teoria e prassi della codifica dei manoscritti, to be published in the Acts of the International Seminar: Gli Zibaldoni di Boccaccio: Memoria, scrittura, riscrittura (Firenze 26-28 aprile 1996). Abstract: In Decembre 1995 Sperberg-McQueen, Lancashire, Durosau, Burnard, Mller, and DeRose discussed on Humanist some important features of the problems concerning the encoding of texts and the use of SGML and TEI standards: interpretations necessary for each encoding; correct represenation of grapheme in electronic environment; relations between encoding and editorial practices; purposes of the author in graphically organizing the text; distinction of types of markup; materiality of the text and representation of connotations; allography and orthography. This contribution is an effort to trace a theoretical structure which may include all such problems and help to solve them. Such theoretical structure depends on clearing the semiotic passages through which a text (message) goes from the author to the (last) reader. To clarify such passages some concepts are taken into consideration: the competence of the author and of the encoder; the different levels of a text: physical, "virtual", ideal; meaning of features of the text outside the pure sequence of graphemes; specific features of the electronic representation of the text; representation vs. substitution. Encoding cannot be based on the physical appearence of the text, but on the "virtual" text in the mind of those who have written it, and should be able to represent each element in the text contributing to its meaning. The encoder should therefore propose a complete table of correspondences. From: John Unsworth Subject: New software from IATH Date: Tue, 7 May 1996 11:08:32 -0400 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 10 (10) The Institute for Advanced Technology in the Humanities is pleased to announce the availability of two new software products, Inote and Mu, programmed by Mark Ratliff and Dan Ancona, respectively: Inote is a Java-based program for image annotation; it can be run through the web or stand-alone (with the Java developer's kit). Demonstrations, further information, source code, help documents, and an email/hypermail list for bug reports and developers, are all available at: http://jefferson.village.virginia.edu/inote/ MU is a perl-based program that builds fill-out forms for SGML editing, based on simple templates. It supports lock files (for networked workgroups), and it is distributed with a TEI-lite template. Demonstrations, source code, help files, and an email list for bug reports and developers are available at: http://jefferson.village.virginia.edu/mu/ Inote will work on any platform that supports Java (Windows95/NT and most Unix platforms, but not Windows 3.1, and only to a limited extent on Macs). Mu will work with any browser that supports fill-out forms, but the main program needs to be installed on machine that runs Perl (Unix Web servers, and some other platforms). If your web server is configured to permit cgi in user directories, you will not need root/supervisor access to install MU. Please download these programs, experiment with them, and report your experiences to their respective email discussion lists. We will be releasing future versions of both packages, so your feedback, suggestions, and contributions are welcome. John Unsworth ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ http://www.village.virginia.edu/~jmu2m/ jmu2m@virginia.edu From: Subject: NEW: electronic thesis/diss site Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 11 (11) This is to announce a new web site I have developed for on-line references and resources related to electronic masters theses and doctoral dissertations (ETDs) in the humanities, including a directory of such work currently in progress: http://osi.lib.virginia.edu/ediss/ediss.html If you are a graduate student now at work on an ETD, please stop by and fill out a short form describing your project (available off of the "currently in progress" page). The information you provide will be added to the site's on-line ETD directory, which I hope will serve as a resource for other graduate students who are in the process of seeking approval for such work. I'd also like to hear from anyone who might have other suggestions as to the content or potential uses of this site. I envision it as a sort of clearing-house for ETD materials, including pointers to on-line initiatives and guidelines, publications, services, archived mailing-list discussions, and other relevant humanities computing materials. Some of the pages are stretched a bit thin, as ETDs have not attracted as much attention as other forms of scholarly electronic publishing; if you know of any ETD resources that I have not included, please tell me about them; also, please check back from time to time as the site expands. Potential audiences include not only graduate students but also faculty who want to make informed decisions about supervising an ETD, as well as librarians, administrators, and publishers. I have tentative plans to innaugerate a mailing list devoted to this topic as well. Please forward this announcement as seems appropriate, and please excuse cross-postings. Special thanks to the University of Virginia Library's On-Line Scholarship Initiative and Special Collections Deptartment for providing server space. Comments should be sent to me at the address below. ================================================================= Matthew G. Kirschenbaum University of Virginia mgk3k@virginia.edu Department of English http://faraday.clas.virginia.edu/~mgk3k Electronic Text Center From: Subject: Re: 10.1 happy birthday to Humanist Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 12 (12) To the established teaching positions, add: "Informatica applicata alle Scienze Umane" at the Faculty of Letters, Rome University La Sapienza, which I keep after 2 years. Information: http://cisadu.let.uniroma1.it Tito Orlandi. From: "Peter Graham, RUL" Subject: Re: 10.4 citing Web documents Date: Tue, 7 May 96 23:10:16 EDT X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 13 (13) With all respect, I think Willard McCarty's musings on the value of impermanent scholarship verge too much on trendiness to be helpful. By which I mean he appears too easily to accept what presents itself as the current reality; I think it's important to lead the parade in the right direction rather than just join it. Certainly electronic communication is not like print and we can't try to apply all print models to it; but we can try to apply models or values that we think are important. One of those values is the idea that something worth saying is something worth keeping, which we have embedded in writing and printing and other marking ("recording") techniques. There are techniques in development that will allow us to keep what has been recorded electronically, and I look forward to having them in our quiver. The fact that a quantity of scholarship (and conversation in various media) is pretty disposable doesn't warrant not trying to keep what is valuable. Baby and bathwater here. (Certainly a lot of published material deserves ephemerality; in the first place, how do we judge it any better than the publishers; and in the second place, that's not an argument for ephemerizing it all.) I think WMcC is absolutely right in citing the Stanford economist (very possibly Ed Shaw--sounds like him) on the difficulty in changing the academic culture by changing publishing patterns. Makes it all the more important to try and to do it well. --pg Peter Graham psgraham@gandalf.rutgers.edu Rutgers University Libraries 169 College Ave., New Brunswick, NJ 08903 (908)445-5908; fax (908)445-5888 http://aultnis.rutgers.edu/pghome.html> From: Marta Steele Subject: transitory/permanent Date: Wed, 8 May 1996 14:05:01 EST X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 14 (14) The notion of permanence in publishing is one of my favorite subjects/obsessions; not only does a paper/internet dichotomy make sense, substituting the internet for the strictly transitory, like stock market reports of the day, etc., but we need a third category, the "aei" element, which we must preserve for the remote future: the products of our research that we let die only at the peril of remote posterity: picture those poor souls having to reconstruct Greek from nothing but the hundreds of different ways that we transliterate it into the roman alphabet (ok, that's a slight exaggeration), if that happens to be the only Greek that remains due to natural forces and unnatural bellicose forms of destruction of various types. What I'm trying to say is that we ought to carve into stone, into eternity, what we have struggled so hard to reconstruct about classical civilization in even the last 200 years. Think how hard we had to work; think what they're having to do now to try to decipher what remains of the Dead Sea Scrolls; look what they had to do to decipher Linear B. All that is timeless and should be literally preserved via a medium more durable than (forgive me, this is my livelihood) even the book. What could that be? How can we transcend future holocausts and other natural destruction and preserve this category of knowledge for all time, to avoid future dark ages? I guess we have to turn to science? I'm sure there are ways, if we agree this is an important issue and resolve to address it. Marta Steele Princeton University Press From: Subject: HLT Survey on the WWW Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 15 (15) A book entitled "Survey of the State of the Art of Human Language Technology" is now available at http://www.cse.ogi.edu/CSLU/HLTsurvey/ . The survey consists of articles by 97 authors in the following chapters: 1. Spoken Language Input 2. Written Language Input 3. Language Analysis and Understanding 4. Language Generation 5. Spoken Output Technologies 6. Discourse and Dialogue 7. Document Processing 8. Multilinguality 9. Multimodality 10. Transmission and Storage 11. Mathematical Methods 12. Language Resources 13. Evaluation Within a few months, the Survey will be published as a book by Giardini Publishers in Italy and by Cambridge University Press elsewhere. The electronic version of the Survey will remain on-line, but will be modified slightly based on copy-editing by the publishers. The Survey was funded by the National Science Foundation and the European Commission, with additional support provided by the Center for Spoken Language Understanding at the Oregon Graduate Institute and the University of Pisa. Enjoy! Editorial Board Ron Cole Editor-in-Chief Joseph Mariani Hans Uszkoreit Annie Zaenen Victor Zue Managing Editors Giovanni Battista Varile Antonio Zampolli -------------------------------------------------- Vince Weatherill Center for Spoken Language Understanding Oregon Graduate Institute of Science & Technology vincew@cse.ogi.edu 503-690-1142 __________________________________________________ From: Stephan Khinoy Subject: Re: 10.4 citing Web documents Date: Wed, 8 May 1996 23:47:46 GMT X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 16 (16) We can already cite ephemeral sources of information: "unpublished paper," "personal communication," and the like. When we post electronically, we have to be sure to list some actual-world coordinates like academic address, and we should be considerate in citing *our* sources and how we have treated them. In that way, when someone cites us, it will be a responsible citation. -- Stephan Khinoy From: Willard McCarty Subject: leading or pulling the parade? Date: Thu, 9 May 1996 00:11:53 -0400 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 17 (17) Opposition being true friendship, I am glad for Peter Graham's critical response in Humanist 10.8 to my notion that the e-medium, now transitory, should be used for transitory things. He says that I appear "too easily to accept what presents itself as the current reality; I think it's important to lead the parade in the right direction rather than just join it." This points to the question I was attempting to raise: when are we leading this parade, and when are we stubbornly forcing it to go contrary to its own genius, pulling it along against its will? I think it's important to feel the contrary tug, the essential resistance to our insensitive commandeering of one thing to be something else that it is not. I guess what Peter would say is that it's just as important to feel the cooperative willingness to follow. I think of the exercise known as "push hands" in Tai Chi Chuan. I am raising the question: which are we doing now in our efforts to make the electronic medium more permanent? WM From: "DONALD A. COLEMAN (EXT. 2850)" Subject: Re: Impermanence Date: Thu, 09 May 1996 13:19:10 -0500 (EST) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 18 (18) All interests Humanists: I hope no one will be disappointed to find a message like this one in the e-mail sack; assuredly it could seem like idle fantasy rather than responsible argument. All the same, the messages I've just been reading raise again in my mind a question which I've sometimes found myself asking: what do we of this scientized era suppose that future antiquarians a re going to do whith our scientized archives when the science that alone makes them useable has long since been forgotten? I think that at present a sort of evolutionist fabrication exists--indeed, a notion fashioned out of whole cloth--to the effect that science once done cannot be undone: that people in *our* future simply *couldn't* be antiquarians and, at the same time, have chosen classical understandings and a simple life over a world fashioned in the image and under the aegis of scientific technology. We have half a chance of deciphering the Dead Sea Scrolls because we've had the wisdom to preserve, at least in some measure, the crafts of reading and writing, whose dependence on science is negligible. But if we ourselves can preserve our achievements only in ways radically dependent on science, do we not run the risk of depriving future civilizations of those achievements? I think that we can use science as an invaluable aid in preserving what we judge to be valuable, but I also think that in so doing we need to use wisdom. We need to provide access to the good things we have on the broadest possible terms. From: Subject: DRH'96 Programme & Registration Form Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 19 (19) DRH 96 digital resources for the humanities A Conference to be held at Somerville College, Oxford 1st - 3rd July 1996 The conference has been sponsored by: The British Library Cambridge University Press The Centre for Humanities Computing, Oxford The Centre for Information Management and Technology for Scholarship, London Guildhall University Chadwyck-Healey Ltd The CTI Centre for Textual Studies, Oxford The Humanities Research Institute, Sheffield The Office for Humanities Communication, Oxford The Institute for Electronic Library Research, De Montfort University Conference Organisation The Conference is being organised by the Continuing Professional Development Centre of the University of Oxford. For queries or further information please contact: Christine Merle CPD Centre Department for Continuing Education University of Oxford 67 St Giles Oxford, OX1 3LU Tel: +44 1865 288166 Fax: +44 1865 288163 Email: christine.merle@conted.ox.ac.uk URL: http://users.ox.ac.uk/~drh96/ Advances in computing affect all who work with the fundamental resources of humanities scholarship. Long-held paradigms of scholarly resources-their ownership, their use, their distribution-are being transformed. Archivists, librarians, scholars, and publishers have to rework their relationships in this new information world, without losing sight of the traditional values of academic discourse. This conference will provide a forum to explore these changes and to seek the best ways to exploit them together.Please note that the programme is provisional at this stage, and that some papers, or entire sessions may need to be rearranged. A final programme will be provided at the conference, together with a book of abstracts. Sessions will run in parallel strands (usually three at a time) and there will be an exhibition running throughout the conference. Delegates wishing to demonstrate software during the conference are asked to apply as soon as possible to the Conference Co-ordinator. Conference Venue The conference will be held at Somerville College, Oxford. Somerville College was founded in 1879 to promote the higher education of women. More than one century later, and numbering many famous women amongst its old members including many heads of states, the College is ideally situated for conference delegates. It is just a few minutes from the centre of Oxford with its many historic college and university buildings, museums, libraries and art galleries. Oxford, which is widely regarded as one of the most beautiful cities in Europe, has excellent rail and road links, with frequent bus and train services to London and other major cities. For international delegates, frequent coach services are available from the bus stations situated at Heathrow and Gatwick airports. The journey from Heathrow Airport takes about one hour. Accommodation Accommodation will be provided in single study bedrooms which are comfortable, if unpretentious, with washbasin and shared bathroom facilities. The cost of accommodation for two nights - 1st and 2nd July - is included in the Conference Fee. If you would like additional accommodation for any of the following nights this is available at an additional charge of 30 pounds per night for bed and breakfast. Please indicate your requirements on the Registration Form. Dinners will not be provided at Somerville College on these additional nights. However there are plenty of excellent restaurant close to Somerville College and list of restaurants will be available at the Registration Desk.=20 Registration The conference will run from lunchtime on 1st July 1996 until lunchtime on 3rd July 1996. Accommodation and meals will be provided for all delegates at Somerville College. The full cost of the conference is 275 pounds sterling. This price includes accommodation for 2 nights of July 1st and 2nd, registration fee, conference proceedings, and all meals including dinner on 1st July and the conference banquet. A non-residential rate is also available and the charge for this is 225 pounds. This price includes the registration fee, conference proceedings, all meals including dinner on 1st July and the banquet on 2nd July. Partner rates are also available at 125 pounds. This price includes two nights accommodation (1st and 2nd July), Dinner on 1st July, Welcome Reception on 1st July and the Reception and Banquet on 2nd July (lunches and daytime refreshments are not included). A limited number of bursaries are available to students and non-waged persons and will be awarded in order of application. To qualify, please apply by 5th June, stating why you want to attend and what you hope to get out of the conference. The fee with a bursary will be half the quoted conference price.=20 Bank Charges: Delegates paying with cheques drawn on non-UK banks or by credit card (VISA or MASTERCARD only), should add an additional 15 pounds t= o cover bank charges. Please indicate on your registration form if you would like to pay by Credit Card or Bank Transfer. Cancellations: Full refunds of the Conference Fee, less 25% administration costs, are payable for cancellations received in writing on or before Monday 3rd June. After this date, no fees are refundable; however, substitutions can be made at any time and at no extra cost. CONFERENCE PROGRAMME MONDAY 1ST JULY 10.00-13.00 Registration 13.00-13.30 Lunch 14.00-14.15 Welcome 14.15-14.45 Introduction, Marilyn Deegan, The International Institute for Electronic Library Research, De Montfort University, on behalf of the programme committee. 14.45-15.30 Keynote address Sir Charles Chadwyck-Healey 15.30-16.00 Tea 16.00-17.30 1) Critical Editing in the Digital Age Donald Broady, Royal Institute of Technology/NADA, Stockholm, 'Digital Critical Editions. The Case of the Swedish National Edition of August Strindberg's Collected Works'. David R Chesnutt, University of South Carolina, & C. M. Sperberg-McQueen, University of Illinois at Chicago and editor, Text Encoding Initiative, 'The Model Editions Partnership: Creating Editions of Historical Documents for the Digital Age'. John Lavagnino, Women Writers Project, Brown University, 'Reference and Allusion in Scholarly Writing, and the Problems they Pose for Digital Libraries'. 2) Digital Resources for Teaching Christian Kay, STELLA Project, University of Glasgow (chair). Ann Gow, STELLA Project, University of Glasgow, 'The COMET Project'. Jean Anderson, STELLA Project, University of Glasgow, 'A Guide to Scottish literature'. Michael Fraser, CTI Centre for Textual Studies, University of Oxford, 'Digital Resources and the Teaching of the Humanities'. 3) Workshop, 'Capturing Digital Images' Andrew Prescott, Manuscript Collection, British Library (chair) Hazel Podmore, Collections and Preservation, British Library Peter Carey, Collections and Preservation, British Library David French, Collections and Preservation, British Library Richard Masters, Document and Image Processing, British Library 18.30 Drinks Reception 19.30 Dinner TUESDAY 2ND JULY 9.00-10.30 1) Resources for Medieval Studies Michael Arnott, Iain Beavan, and Jane Geddes, University of Aberdeen, 'The Online Aberdeen Bestiary: Text and Hypertext'. Martin K Foys and James Caccamo, Loyola University, Chicago, 'A Digital Facsimile of the Bayeux Tapestry'. Carolyn Schriber, Rhodes College, 'The Online Resource Book for Medieval Studies'. 2) Women's Archives. Julia Flanders, Women Writers Project, Brown University, 'Gender, Anxiety, and the Electronic Text'. Lesley Gordon, University of Newcastle upon Tyne, 'The Gertrude Bell Archive.' Kathryn Sutherland, University of Nottingham,' Revising the Model: Computers, Women's Writings and the Protocols of Editing'. 3) Electronic Publishing Panel Andrew Rosenheim, Oxford University Press Kevin Taylor, Cambridge University Press Colin Day, University of Michigan Press 4) Editing Traditional Texts Peter Donaldson, MIT, 'Shakespeare Electronic Archive'. Timothy Finney, Baptist Theological College of Western Australia, Murdoch, 'Transcribing New Testament Manuscripts'. Speaker to be announced 10.30-11.00 Coffee 11.00-12.30 1) Digital Resources and the Text Encoding Initiative Milena Dobreva, Institute of Maths and Science, Sofia, 'Problems in Design and Use of TEI based Repertoire of Slavic Manuscripts'. Espen Ore, Norwegian Computing Centre for the Humanities, 'Runic Inscriptions meet TEI and its WSDs'. C M Sperberg-McQueen, University of Illinois at Chicago and editor, Text Encoding Initiative,'What TEI Means for your Project'. 2) The York Doomsday Project Meg Twycross and Paul Williams, Lancaster University. 3) Workshop, 'Making an Electronic Edition of a Text in Many Versions' Peter Robinson, The International Institute for Electronic Library Research, De Montfort University. 13.00-13.30 Lunch 14.00-15.30 1) Digitizing Visual Resources Manfred Thaller, Max-Planck Institut, G=F6ttingen, 'Objects as Digital Resources'. Jennifer Trant, Getty Art History Information Program, 'The Museum Educational Site Licensing (MESL) Project: Enabling Educational Use of Digital Museum Collections'. Joseph Viscomi, University of Virginia, 'Constructing the Blake Archive: A Progress Report'. 2) Networked Resources Colin Day, University of Michigan Press, 'Designing a Networked System for Disseminating Academic Writings'. Charles Henry, Vassar College, 'The American Arts and Letters Network: An Experiment in Web Communities'. Suzette Worden and Colin Beardon, Centre for Computers and Creative Work, University of Brighton, 'The Virtual Curator: Educational Software, the Context of Collaborative Development and Authorship'. 3) First Panel on 'Resource Providers and Services' The UK Arts and Humanities Data Service Harold Short, King's College, London (chair) Lou Burnard, Oxford University Daniel Greenstein, Director AHDS Executive 15.30- 16.00 1) Retrieving Digital Resources Rachel Heery, UKOLN, University of Bath, 'Resource Discovery Tools'. Lynn F Marko, Judith A. Ahronheim, and Kevin L. Butterfield, University of Michigan Library, 'The Humanities Text Initiative: A Collaboration Among Text Producers, Editors, and Cataloguers'. Jackie Shieh, University of Virginia Library, 'Overview on Organizing the Seemingly Unorganizable: Remote Access Files'. 2) Second Panel on 'Resource Services and Providers' International Aspects Daniel Greenstein, Director AHDS Executive (chair) Peter Doorn and Annuska Graver, Netherlands Historical Data Archive, 'Providing Digital Information for Historians'. David Green, Director American National Initiative for a Networked Cultural Heritage. Lyn Elliot Sherwood, Director Canadian Heritage Information Network. 3) Workshop 'Using Digital Images ' Andrew Prescott, Manuscript Collection, British Library (chair) Clive Izard, British Library Leona Carpenter, Computing and Telecommunications, British Library Phil Barden, Document Supply Centre, British Library 19.00 Drinks Reception 19.30 Conference Banquet After-dinner speaker Ron Zweig, Tel Aviv University WEDNESDAY 3RD JULY 9.00-10.30 1) Digital Case Histories David L Gants, Electronic Text Center, University of Virginia, 'Commercial Printing in Early Modern London: A Digital Case History'. Mary Keeler and Christian Kloesel '"Kantinuity" and the Evolution of Pragmatism in C S Peirce's Manuscripts'. Maria Sollohub, the Wittgenstein Archives, 'Choices in the Preparation of Electronic Manuscript Resources-the Wittgenstein Archives at the University of Bergen'. 2) Editions for the Future Peter Robinson, The International Institute for Electronic Library Research, De Montfort University (chair) Richard Finneran, 'The Hypermedia Yeats'. Hoyt M Duggan, 'The Parts of an Electronic Archive: Documentary and Facsimile Editions of Piers Plowman Manuscripts'. George Landow, Brown University, Title to be advised. 3) The New Dictionary of National Biography (DNB): Computation and a large Cooperative Project Colin Matthew, Elizabeth Baigent, and Robert Faber. 10.30-11.00 Coffee 11.00-12.00 Keynote address David Greetham 12.00-12.30 Close of Conference 13.00-13.30 Lunch and departure - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -= =20 Conference Registration Form [A WWW form is available at http://users.ox.ac.uk/~drh96] Please register the following delegate for the conference (for multiple registrations or partners please complete seperate forms): Title (Dr/Mr/Ms etc).................................................. First Name............................................................ Family Name/Surname................................................... Position/Job Title.................................................... Organisation.......................................................... Full Mailing Address.................................................. Postcode.............................................................. Country............................................................... Telephone............................................................. Fax................................................................... Please indicate registration fee payable: [ ] Registration Fee @ 275 pounds [ ] Registration Fee (non-residential) @ 225 pounds [ ] Partner Registration Fee @ 125 pounds Bank Charge @ 15 pounds (cheques drawn on non-UK banks and credit card=20 payments) Accommodation Please reserve additional accommodation as follows: [ ] Bed and Breakfast for Saturday 30th June @ 30 pounds [ ] Bed and Breakfast for Sunday 30th June @ 30 pounds [ ] Bed and Breakfast for Wednesday 3rd July @ 30 pounds Bed and Breakfast for Monday 1st July and Tuesday 2nd July are included in the Registration Fee. Total Fee Payable =A3...................................................... Please indicate method of payment: [ ] Cheque enclosed [ ] Institutional Purchase Code (please specify)......................... [ ] Please Invoice [ ] Credit Card Form Required [ ] Bank Transfer - Please send necessary form Please debit my VISA [ ] MASTERCARD [ ] CARD NUMBER.............................................................. EXPIRY DATE.............................................................. Signature:............................................................... Card Holders Address..................................................... ........................................................................... ........................................................................... Please return printed forms to Christine Merle, CPD Centre, University of Oxford, 67 St Giles, Oxford, OX1 3LU, UK. Tel: +44 (1865) 288166=20 Fax: +44 (1865) 288163.=20 Electronic forms may emailed to christine.merle@conted.ox.ac.uk From: Subject: optimism Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 20 (20) A fellow Humanist has taken me to task, gently but firmly, for the optimism in my birthday message. He asked me not to forward the note to the group, so I am doing the next best thing, which is to paraphrase his objection and then to reply. How possibly can anyone be optimistic when so much around us is shutting down and turning inward? The optimist is perhaps always a fool, sometimes only a little foolish, sometimes a big one. Thus the spectrum of possibilities I contemplate for myself. My intention was not, however, to ignore the realities, rather it was more a call to arms for those who still have the energy to raise them. The economy may be against us, the Zeitgeist may be a crabbed and selfish spirit, but our wisdom is needed and in some places is in demand. It may be that the intellectual life will move out of the university and that to live it will mean for most a choice between the sofa and the desk chair in the evening, but there seems no question at all that humanities computing will play a growing role in how this life is lived, despite all. Not for everyone, of course, but for many. There are strong forces at work. I referred in my birthday message to recognition at high levels of the academy that we must play a central role. At the same time, one of the principal barriers, the relegation of humanities computing to the role of a mere "service", makes less and less sense, even as budgetary forces oppose its advancement. A passage I keep returning to in this regard -- forgive me, no doubt I have quoted it before -- is from Jaroslav Pelikan's book, The Idea of the University, where briefly he touches on the role of technology in the changing structure of the institution. With your indulgence I will quote it here: "Just as the reexamination of the idea of the university implies new attention to university's definition of itself as a community in its teaching, so the definition of the university as a community of research requires significant reconsideration in the light of the "sisterly disposition" of the sciences toward one another. That applies in the first instance to those departments, agencies, and personnel of the university who usually stand outside the classroom but without whom research would halt. Because of its unique position among these as the heart of the university, the university library... must be seen as a collegial part of a total university network of support services for research, and the network must be seen as a free and responsible community if it is to be equal to the complexities that are faced by university-based research. Indeed, even such a term as "providers of support services" is becoming far too limited to describe both the skills and the knowledge required of those who hold such positions. Scholars and scientists in all fields have found that the older configurations of such services, according to which the principal investigator has the questions and the staff person provides answers, are no longer valid, if they ever were; as both the technological expertise and scholarly range necessary for research to grow, it is also for the formulation and refinement of the questions themselves that principal investigators have to turn to "staff", whom it is increasingly necessary -- not as a matter of courtesy, much less a matter of condescension, but as a matter of justice and of accuracy -- to identify instead as colleagues in the research enterprise." (Yale U.P., p. 62) I suggest that we adopt the term "collegial service" to describe what now must happen, and that we equate it to the service-component common to academic jobs in N. America and the U.K. Perhaps a mere term will help to blur or in some cases to erase the often sharp boundary of privilege. All this to prove my optimism. Comments? WM From: Subject: Pronouncing the "@" sign. Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 21 (21) A discussion has been going on on ExLibris about the "@" sign and its origin (probably a medieval scribal abbreviation). Also at issue is its pronunciation in different languages. What does one say in German, French, Italian, and in the many non-European languages on the internet when in English one gives an e-mail address, say "jones@exeter.ac.uk" as "jones at exeter.ac.uk" (allowing for the fact that the period is uttered as "dot")? ******************************************************************************* Germaine Warkentin warkent@chass.utoronto.ca English, Victoria College, University of Toronto ******************************************************************************* From: Subject: Optimism, etc. Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 22 (22) I thank Willard for taking the time to paraphrase my objections regarding his optimistic "call to arms." (I appreciated the quote from Pelikan.) One of my original questions, however, escaped his paraphrase. With regard to assessing the impact of humanities-computing in generating new employment opportunities, I wondered if conflating the American and Canadian situations might conceal as much as it reveals. I've had numerous interviews for professional and professional-academic, humanities-computing positions in the States, but where are the positions in Canada? I *sense* that despite the "supranationalism" that "global" networking perpetuates (and, to a large degree, precipitates) we (i.e. Canadians) should not be too quick to conflate the Canadian and American situations in offering an overall assessment of the impact of humanities-computing. I may be way out in left field on this one, but I would appreciate comments and comparisons between the two situations. BTW, where can one go to find "solid data" with which to assess the impact that humanities-computing has had on North American universities? Best, Todd P.S. I apologize for focussing on North American issues in an international forum. _____________________________________________________ Todd Blayone - tblayone@peinet.pe.ca Project Coordinator, Chorus Ph.D. Candidate, McGill University http://www.chorus.cycor.ca/blayone/todd.html From: Subject: First International Virtual Conference on Mad Science Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 23 (23) IVCMS'96 Things are getting tough for mad scientists, apparently. According to Michael Smith, in "The cyberspatial return of the mad scientist. Quick, Igor", (Mind & Matter, The Globe and Mail, 11/5/96), research grants for maniacal science are rare, and those castles in the Carpathian Mountains "now tend to be occupied by New York yuppies with their own private Learjets. The supply of spinally challenged troglodytes named Igor has all but disappeared. 'Plus', as one mad scientist put it, 'you can't get insurance.'" Thus ICVMS'96, intended "to reverse this distressing trend, put mad science back on the world agenda, and in the words of the organizer Paul Schleifer, 'replace the old drooling maniac stereotype of the mad scientist with a new drooling-maniac image that is more appropriate to the modern era.'" ICVMS'96 is taking its virtual place online, "which makes it possible to hold such an event 'without the usual overheads of building baroque laboratories, finding formaldehyde-free corpses and liberating prospective contributors from their respective institutions.'" Visiting Mr. Schleifer's Web site, at the URL http://www.ftech.co.uk/~madsite/ as the "the 7552nd aspirant delver into Things Best Left Unknown since 9 February 1996", I found the following statement of the conference theme: --------------------------------------------------------------------- THEME Mad science is a much maligned domain of human knowledge and its practitioners have for too long been relegated to B-movies and remote ancestral estates. IVCMS provides an international forum for the presentation, discussion and extension of research into these darkly powerful pseudosciences and dangerous technologies which fall beyond the scope of conventional science and good taste. The purpose of the conference is to promote a general understanding of mad topics within the broader scientific community, to encourage new researchers to dabble with things best left alone, to attract commercial sponsors to the potential benefits of mad science in the business world, and to replace the old drooling maniac stereotype of the mad scientist with a new drooling maniac image which is more appropriate to the modern era. The conference is hosted on the Web to avoid the overheads of unpredictable atmospheric conditions and revolting peasants. 44 candidate delegates are currently in attendance and available to discuss their papers in the Mad Science Masquerade. Correspondence from other mad scientists may also be viewed. --------------------------------------------------------------------- Mr. Schleifer and his colleagues are now evaluating these 44 contributions for inclusion in the final conference programme. He plans to set up an Internet chat line on 24 June "for live (and possibly undead) discussion of those that make the cut." Mr. Schleifer is a PhD candidate at a London university that he wisely prefers not to have named. I am very much hoping that he is doing his work at King's. Just what would a mad humanist be like? Nominations are open. WM From: Subject: Call for Papers: ANTICOMODERNO Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 24 (24) _________________________________________________________ CHORUS http://www.chorus.cycor.ca/chorus.html _________________________________________________________ Chorus (HCR) still needs reviewers for the following items: (Due June 30) 2.Web Squirrel Mac OS-based hypertext/WWW software by Eastgate 3.Cyborg: Engineering The Body Electric Mac OS/Windows, non-fiction (Storyspace) hypertext by Diane Greco, published by Eastgate 6.CorelXara CD-ROM-based, 32-bit Windows graphics application for Internet illustration (Due July 30) 2.Corel WordPerfect Suite CD-ROM-based, 16-bit Windows applications suite published by Corel 3.World History 1996 Multimedia Mac OS/Windows CD-ROM by the Bureau of Electronic Publishing, Inc. 4.Great Authors Multimedia, Mac OS/Windows 3 CD-ROM set featuring "Much Ado about Shakespeare," "Like the Dickens," and "Twain's World" 5.Scholarly Publishing: The Electronic Frontier Book edited by Robin P. Peek and Gregory B. Newby (MIT Press) Prospective reviewers should send the following information to chorus@peinet.pe.ca. (Please include "HCR Review" in your subject line.) Your Name Position/Institutional affiliation Surface address Software title Brief statement of your qualifications _____________________________________________________ Todd Blayone - tblayone@peinet.pe.ca Project Coordinator, Chorus Ph.D. Candidate, McGill University http://www.chorus.cycor.ca/blayone/todd.html From: Fabio Ciotti Subject: Call for Papers: ANTICOMODERNO Date: Mon, 13 May 1996 02:02:02 -100 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 25 (25) CALL FOR PAPERS Deadline: June 15, 1996 For the next issue of ANTICOMODERNO, whose topic will be the Philology from Ancients to Moderns, with a section dedicate to the application of computing to textual criticism, the editors are seeking potential contributors. Below will follow a brief description of the magazine in Italian and in English. ------------------------------------------------------------ Italian version AnticoModerno e' una collana di fascicoli a tema nata per iniziativa di alcuni dottorandi di ricerca in filologia romanza e italianistica dell'Universita' di Roma "La Sapienza" accomunati dall'esigenza di approfondire lo studio di determinati fenomeni su una base temporale ampia, nel tentativo di disegnare dei percorsi che dagli antichi arrivino sino ai moderni in una prospettiva di massima apertura ideologica verso strumenti e tecniche di ricerca. Una versione elettronica della rivista e' in preparazione e sara' ospitata dalla home page del CRILet (Centro Ricerche Informatica e Letteratura) [URL:http://rmcisadu.let.uniroma1.it/crilet] e dal Progetto Manuzio [URL:http://www.liberliber.it]. Ogni numero e' strutturato in tre sezioni: parte monografica, miscellanea e di recensioni/bilanci, tutte ruotanti attorno ad un tema centrale. Il primo volume (Convergenze Testuali) si e' occupato della riprese intertestuali a distanza, con l'attenzione rivolta soprattutto alle riprese di auctoritates classiche e medievali da parte di autori contemporanei; il secondo (La metrica. La sestina e le sue derivazioni) si e' invece concentrato su una forma metrica specifica, cercando di approfondire il senso storico di un fenomeno e la sua portata generale nella prospettiva ampia della tradizione e trasformazione delle forme metriche, dal medioevo ad oggi. Nella sezione miscellanea hanno trovato spazio contributi su varie forme metriche in diverse epoche e letterature, mentre una conclusiva sezione di bilanci fa il punto su alcuni temi specifici. Il prossimo volume sara' dedicato alla Filologia degli Antichi e dei Moderni con l'intento di osservare metodi e lavoro filologico dall'eta' umanistica alle moderne sperimentazioni informatiche. Il dibattito teorico provocato dalla rapida introduzione di nuove tecnologie al servizio della ricerca filologica impone una approfondita riflessione sul senso e i modi della critica testuale oggi; articoli relativi ad esperienze di ricerca e considerazioni metodologiche sono la richiesta che rivolgiamo a tutti coloro i quali intendano collaborare con noi a definire nuovi scenari per la filologia. I contributi non dovranno superare le 20 cartelle Invitiamo ad inviare dei brevi abstract dei contributi proposti entro la data del 15 giugno 1996 ai seguenti indirizzi e:mail: ciotti@ axrma.uniroma1.it bertolo@axrma.uniroma1.it ------------------------------------------------------------ English version AnticoModerno is a periodical publication realized by some PHD students and researchers in Romance Philology and Italian Literary Studies at the University of Rome "La Sapienza". Their main aim is to deepen the study of philological phenomena on a long temporal basis, to find research paths that come from Ancients to Moderns, without ideological inclination towards any methodological perspective . An electronic version of the magazine is forthcoming and will be hosted by CRILet home page (Center for Resarch in Computing and Literary Studies) [URL:http://rmcisadu.let.uniroma1.it/crilet] and by Progetto Manuzio [URL:http://www.liberliber.it]. Each issue is divided in three sections: a monographic section, a miscellaneous section and a reviews section, all addressing one central theme. First issue (Convergenze testuali), has addressed the questions of intertextuality, with a special attention to the emergence of passages from classical auctoritates in contemporary writers; second issue (La metrica. La sestina e le sue derivazioni) was centered on a particular metrical form, the sextine, in the effort to understand the historical sense of a metrical phenomenon, and is influence in the history and evolution of metrical forms from the Middle Age to today. Next issue will be dedicated to The Philology on Ancients and Moderns. The intention of the editors is to examine the methodology of philological activity from Humanism to the contemporary computational experiments. The theoretical debate caused by the rapid introduction of computing in philological and human studies requires a serious consideration on the meaning and methodology of textual criticism. The editors are seeking for contributions on these topics: proposed papers, that should not be longer than 20 pages, can be focused on methodological and theoretical problems as much as on practical experiments and applications. Abstract of proposed papers describing themes and issues of the contribution can be sent by June 15 1996 to the following e:mail addresses: ciotti@axrma.uniroma1.it bertolo@axrma.uniroma1.it From: "Peter Graham, RUL" Subject: the parade Date: Mon, 13 May 96 9:18:59 EDT X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 26 (26) Willard McCarty responds to my concern about the parade and whether to lead or join it with more politeness than I probably deserve. He is certainly right that we may be whipping the sea, that is resisting the natural tendency of the medium. I think what I want to suggest is that it's important we do so. I know however that at times I feel some despair in being able to preserve anything in this environment (and even at times some despair at preserving the culture in any form past a few hundred years, really.) I am reminded, and I suspect that the example works both for and against my case, of what we now know of Homeric epic. It was preserved in spite of the transitoriness of the medium--oral repetition--which arguably is even more transitory than magnetic domains on disks. The mechanisms for preserving it included the many adjectival and adverbial phrases qualifying names and places and things ("wine-dark sea" being the stereotypical example), which apparently did duty as placeholders to piece out the line, as mechanisms for jogging the speaker's memory, and as time-fillers to allow the speaker's memory to work better (I'm sure I've oversimplified and corrupted the real case here). The result was a preservation in a form that was different from the original, whatever that was or if it ever could be said to have existed; yet, it was a preservation; the need was there, felt and responded to. In Tom Stoppard's Arcadia, his leading man Septimus Hodge dismisses the loss of history as unimportant, for we will discover it all again and we only have what we need anyway. Thomasina, the young prodigy whom he tutors, is desolate at the loss of so many Greek plays and of so much history. I'm on Thomasina's side. --pg Peter Graham psgraham@gandalf.rutgers.edu Rutgers University Libraries 169 College Ave., New Brunswick, NJ 08903 (908)445-5908; fax (908)445-5888 http://aultnis.rutgers.edu/pghome.html> From: "Peter Graham, RUL" Subject: Re: 10.10 citation and impermanence Date: Thu, 9 May 96 21:49:31 EDT X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 27 (27) And do not Willard's comments in his next message on Optimism come to bear here? Is it not optimistic to assume we can save human thought in spite of the transience of the medium? Now *there's* a triumph over nature! Should we not be optimistic? Peter Graham psgraham@gandalf.rutgers.edu Rutgers University Libraries 169 College Ave., New Brunswick, NJ 08903 (908)445-5908; fax (908)445-5888 http://aultnis.rutgers.edu/pghome.html> From: Marta Steele Subject: permanence Date: Fri, 10 May 1996 08:33:45 EST X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 28 (28) The future will always rely on the past. I'm just concerned with preserving everything we have so laboriously had to rediscover, which previous generations, for one reason or another, lost. How can we demonstrate more concern for remote posterity than the past ever demonstrated for us? What is the ultimate foresight anyway? And what have we accomplished that is most important to preserve? I reread my posting yesterday and it sounded narrow because of my particular concentrations; I'm sure others in other fields may have similar, parallel concerns? That's all I want to know. Bury a time capsule, made of indelible lead? Bury several of them? Who knows? Marta Steele From: Subject: Re: 10.1 happy birthday to Humanist Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 29 (29) First, congratulations, Willard and others, on Humanist's Anniversary. And, further, special congratulations to you Willard (from a Brit who got a Master's from King's College, London) on your new appointment at King's. I wanted to pick up on your citing the ACLS panel meeting on "Internet-Accessible Scholarly Resources" held during its recent conference in DC. The panel, as you stated, certainly marks ACLS' continuing and concerted efforts at working to address the issues of computing in the humanities, that goes back several years. One thing you didn't mention, however, was that, as executive director of the National Initiative for a Networked Cultural Heritage (affectionately known as NINCH), I chaired and introduced the panel. This was no accident. NINCH was founded by ACLS, working co-equally with the Coalition for Networked Information and Getty AHIP, as a coalition of arts and humanities organizations to help coordinate and lead the way in preparing cultural resources for life on the Internet. ACLS has been a leader in looking at the implications of advancing technologies, especially digital technologies, for scholars in the humanities for many years, and the panel was one way of introducing NINCH to its membership. We are still very young (I came aboard in early March) but NINCH's 23 charter members, ranging from the Smithsonian and Library of Congress to the American Historical Association and the National Association of Artists Organizations, show an interest in learning about the techniques, the advancing technologies, and current projects in representing cultural resources in useful and accessible ways online. They have a lot to learn from each other and one of the challenges facing NINCH is to relate and coordinate the approaches, issues and achievements of the different sectors and disciplines of the (mostly nonprofit) cultural enterprise. One of the most interesting aspects of working on NINCH is comparing different national approaches to this immense opportunity of representing the breadth of cultural resources online in effective and usable forms. Unlike many European countries, there is, characteristically, no centralized national plan for doing this. An opportunity for comparing approaches will be afforded at the DRH 96 conference this July in Oxford. Dan Greenstein from the British Arts & Humanities Data Service will be chairing a session on Tuesday July 2 in which AHDS will be seen alongside NINCH, the Canadian Heritage Information Network (Lyn Elliot Sherwood) and the Netherlands Historical Data Archive (Peter Doorn and Annuska Graver). NINCH's strategy is still evolving: an initial plan will be available this summer. Any questions or those interested in talking further about how NINCH can best operate should e-mail me at david@cni.org. [deleted quotation] From: Subject: Call for Papers - South African Theatre Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 30 (30) On behalf of a colleague at the Open University: The Open University Post-Colonial Literatures Group CALL FOR PAPERS SOUTH AFRICAN THEATRE AS/AND INTERVENTION Papers are invited for a conference on South African Theatre that aims to explore the idea of intervention. We welcome wide-ranging approaches to a re-evaluation of South African Theatre in the post-apartheid era. This is an opportunity to examine strategies of intervention among stage, audience, theatrical forms, critical methodologies, canonical and new texts, well-established and fledgling playwrights, new identities. We are especially interested in the body as a site of race, gender, class, and sexual difference. In re-thinking what we mean by South African Theatre we expect to focus on theoretical, theatrical, and/or societal issues. We anticipate papers that will: investigate the conditions of representation of theatre as intervention, stage interventions in interpretations of South African Theatre, and question the changing role of theatre as an interventionary vehicle. In addition to academic papers three playwrights from South Africa, including the Southern Arts Visiting Writer, Fatima Dike, will participate in a panel discussion and will give readings. Dr. Dennis Walder and I are negotiating the publication of selected papers and the playwrights' panel for submission by the end of 1996. Dates: 30-31st August, 1996. Conference Venue: Centre for English Studies, Seminar Room 362, Senate House, Malet Street, London. Please send abstracts of 200 words for 20-30 minute papers by May 20th, 1996 (although this date is 'negotiable' in view of the nearness of the 20th) to: Marcia Blumberg email: M.Blumberg@OPEN.AC.UK The Open University Phone: 01908 - 652092 Department of Literature Fax: 01908 - 653750 Walton Hall Milton Keynes MK7 6AA United Kingdom _________________________________________________________________________ Cheers Simon _________________________________________________________________________ Simon Rae : S.A.RAE@OPEN.AC.UK (Internet) Academic Computing Service : The Open University, Walton Hall : phone: (01908) 652413 Milton Keynes, MK7 6AA, United Kingdom : fax: (01908) 653744 The URL for the OU's WWW home page is : http://www.open.ac.uk/ From: Dennis Cintra Leite Subject: FW: 10.8 impermanence Date: Tue, 14 May 1996 13:11:37 -0300 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 31 (31) The cost of electronic storage is falling exponentially. The space needed for this storage is becoming infinitesimal as compared to a "paper" library. There is no valid excuse for junking any bibliographical material whatsoever. I would go as far as saying that throwing away information is a crime against humanity, closely akin to book burning. As to the relevance and/or value of this material that is a matter for present and future scholars to study, judge, say and publish but never to destroy. -------------------------------------- dennis cintra leite dennis@eaesp.fgvsp.br sao paulo business school (eaesp/fgv) snail mail:av.9 de julho 2029 sao paulo, sp 01313-902 brazil py2-etn From: Haradda@aol.com Subject: Re: 10.14 citation and impermanence Date: Tue, 14 May 1996 18:24:44 -0400 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 32 (32) First of all let me say that I am a bit outside scholarly citation and impermanence of electronic records in my work. But I am inside because I deal in public electronic records. I have been very concerned with the impermanence of electronic records with the mistakes that crop up when older backups are mistakenly put on the public systems. Files that go random. In my field we have multiple backups of electronic data, print it out hardcopy and/or microfilm off screen everything. With the worst case we can reconstruct from microfilm. If you have enough places where you have stored copies and if you keep updating the technology so you can retreve the data then you will be ok. If I know my history we have this problem everytime a new technology comes along. And things just get lost. Wars, fires, floods, ignorance all have lost infomation in the past. But so has technology. When we went from scrolls to codex's we lost many books because no one cared enough to copy them. As I recall some Roman poet's work survived in only one copy that was copied in the 14th century. An then the original copy was lost. We need to make sure that information gets spread around to everyone. That is the only way I can see that it can be saved. From: henrich@theol.unizh.ch Subject: Re: 10.18 how to say "@"? Date: Tue, 14 May 1996 08:50:26 +0200 (MEST) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 33 (33) Usually I say "at" even when speaking German (and I think this is the original meaning of the sign). In Swiss German, we call it "Affenschwanz" (which means monkey-tail). In Germany, it is called "Klammeraffe" (spider-monkey). -- Rainer Henrich, lic. theol. Bullinger-Briefwechsel-Edition Phone: xx41 1 257 67 54 Kirchgasse 9 Fax: xx41 1 262 14 12 CH-8001 Zuerich e-mail: henrich@theol.unizh.ch Switzerland http://www.unizh.ch/irg/henrich.html From: Lepine Brigitte Subject: Re: 10.18 how to say "@"? Date: Mon, 13 May 1996 19:58:18 -0400 (EDT) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 34 (34) What does one say in German, [deleted quotation]In French (here, in Montreal), I usually hear "a commercial" (which is of course "commercial a". B.Lepine lepineb@ere.umontreal.ca From: Attachment Research Center Subject: Re: 10.18 how to say "@"? Date: Mon, 13 May 1996 20:50:29 -0300 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 35 (35) @ is "arroba" in Spanish; pronounced ah-'roh-bah JC Garelli ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Juan Carlos Garelli, MD, PhD Department of Early Development University of Buenos Aires From: iwml Subject: Re: 10.18 how to say "@"? Date: Tue, 14 May 1996 01:08:07 +0100 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 36 (36) Never mind the "@" sign! On this side of the Atlantic, a period is a full stop in English! Ian Mitchell LAmbert University of KEnt at Canterbury From: Joseph Galron Subject: Re: 10.18 how to say "@"? Date: Mon, 13 May 1996 20:52:19 -0400 (EDT) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 37 (37) Concerning the"@" sign: in Israel, among many compute wizards, this sign is called "Strudel" (because of the shape of an Apfelstrudel) Joseph Galron ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Joseph (Yossi) Galron | Internet: jgalron@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu Jewish Studies Librarian | galron.1@osu.edu Ohio State University Libraries | or jgalron@aleph.lib.ohio-state.edu 308 Main Library | URL http://aleph.lib.ohio-state.edu From: kosters@rulub4.LeidenUniv.nl Subject: Re: 10.18 how to say "@"? Date: Tue, 14 May 1996 09:15:36 +0000 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 38 (38) Here in The Netherlands many of us say *apestaartje* (i.e. *monkey's tail*) or *slingeraap* (i.e. spider monkey, according to the dictionary) for *@*. The habit usually stops from the moment we know what *@* really means (i.e. *at*). OnnOKosters From: "Charles C. Hadley" Subject: Re: 10.18 how to say "@"? Date: Tue, 14 May 96 12:38:28 +0200 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 39 (39) In French I sometimes say "at" (in English), sometimes "arobace" (the French name for the typographic character), sometimes "a" with circular gesticulations. the "dot" is "point", incidentally. -=+=- -=+=- -=+=- -=+=- -=+=- -=+=- -=+=- -=+=- -=+=- -=+=- Charles C. Hadley, Doyen ! ...by these [words] be admonished: Faculte des Langues ! of making many books there is Universite Jean Moulin - Lyon 3 ! no end, and much study is a 74 rue Pasteur ! weariness of the flesh 69002 Lyon, France ! --Ecclesiates 12:12 phone (33) 72 72 20 88 ! hadley@univ-lyon3.fr ! -=+=- -=+=- -=+=- -=+=- -=+=- -=+=- -=+=- -=+=- -=+=- -=+=- .... . From: Willard McCarty Subject: @ Date: Tue, 14 May 1996 08:03:37 -0400 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 40 (40) Perhaps someone more learned in palaeography than I will confirm that the @, "at-sign", is derived from the minuscule letter "a" by extending the terminal stroke (at the lower right-hand corner) counterclockwise up and over the top of the letter, then around it to the base-line. It is, I think, a "commercial a" in the sense that it was used by if not devised to serve those transcribing items with their prices, "5 pounds of potatoes AT 2 cents per pound". It would be interesting if in any language other than English the sense of "at" were to be used in speaking the @. WM Willard McCarty, Univ. of Toronto || Willard.McCarty@utoronto.ca http://www.epas.utoronto.ca:8080/~mccarty/wlm/ From: Dennis Cintra Leite Subject: RE: 10.18 how to say "@"? Date: Tue, 14 May 1996 13:17:22 -0300 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 41 (41) In Portuguese we would say "arroba" - the reason being that the @ sign is used as notation for a measure of weight (non metric, equivalent to about 15 kilograms and somewhat obsolete) with that pronunciation. From: Subject: Annual Review online Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 42 (42) We've been mulling over doing part of our annual review process online since it currently generates such a cumbersome pile of paper which costs our department a good deal to reproduce. As a multi-campus department, moving information around on paper is a big problem. Switching to HTML annual reviews would save on material costs (of course at the expense of materially increasing the labor for the person being reviewed); but we are worried about confidentiality. Most people don't mind having their vitas on the Web, but student evaluations, work-in-progress, and a lot of other things shouldn't be there. I just realized that one could submit an electronic report on diskette, with relative links to confidential documents on the same disk and absolute links to materials mounted publically on the Web. (Our office computers all have ethernet connections to the Web.) Has anybody ever tried anything like this? How did it work? Paul Brians, Department of English,Washington State University Pullman, WA 99164-5020 brians@wsu.edu http://www.wsu.edu:8080/~brians From: Subject: Re: 10.19 @ = Affenschwanz, Klammeraffe, a commercial, Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 43 (43) arroba, Strudel, apestaartje, slingeraap, arobace -- FULL STOP! In Swedish, @ is called "snabel-a" (a with a trunk) or "kanelbulle" (cinnamon bun, from its similarity in shape), or, more soberly, "at" (i. e. the English word). From: Subject: Teaching and Language Corpora 96 Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 44 (44) CALL FOR PARTICIPANTS TALC96 - TEACHING AND LANGUAGE CORPORA Lancaster University, UK, 9th-12th August, 1996 INCLUDED IN THIS EMAIL: General Details Provisional Programme Registration Details AIMS OF THE CONFERENCE While the use of computer text corpora in research is now well established, they are now being used increasingly for teaching purposes. This includes the use of corpus data to inform and create teaching materials; it also includes the direct exploration of corpora by students, both in the study of linguistics and of foreign languages. Talc96 will build upon the success of Talc94, which brought together researchers and teachers who are involved in such work, to take part in an international exchange of current experience and expertise. THEMES KEY THEME: Talc96 will have a special focus on evaluating the claims made for corpora in linguistics and language teaching. OTHER THEMES: which the conference is expected to cover include - 1.) The use of corpora in student led learning and investigation. 2.) Software for corpus based language and linguistics learning. 3.) Developing corpora for teaching purposes. 4.) The exploitation of corpus based teaching and learning materials. 5.) The theory and practice of corpus based teaching and learning. Papers presented at the conference will be of the typical 20 minutes talk plus ten minutes of questions format. WORKSHOPS Talc96 will also host several workshops related to teaching and language corpora. To give an example of what those workshops may be, Talc94 had a variety of workshops such as "Multilingual Corpus Building" and "Concordancing and Corpus Retrieval". Workshops will be of one to two hour duration. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- TALC96 - Provisional Programme. Day One (9th August): 09.00 - 13.00: Registration and Welcome. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 13.00 - 15.00: General Issues in Teaching and Language Corpora I 1. Issues in Applied Corpus Linguistics, Lynne Flowerdew, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology 2. Corpus Linguistics - evaluating the diffusion of an innovation, Chris Kennedy, University of Birmingham 3. Concordancing in English Language Teaching, Bernhard Kettemann, University of Graz 4. The Role of the Corpus Based 'Phrasicon' in English Language Teaching, Stephen Magee, University of St Andrews and Michael Rundell ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 15.00 - 15.30: Refreshments Break ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 15.30 - 17.00: Creating Materials and Tests 1. CALL Materials Derived from Integrating 'Expert' and 'Interlanguage' Corpora Findings, Lynne Flowerdew, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology 2. Multilingual concordance-based exercise types, Francine Roussel, University of Nancy 3. Using Corpus Word Frequency Data in the Automatic Generation of English Language Cloze Tests, David Coniam, Chinese University of Hong Kong ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 19.00 Dinner ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Day Two (10th August) 9.00-11.00: Parallel Corpora in Language Teaching and Translation 1. Parallel Texts in Language Teaching, Michael Barlow, Rice University 2. Corpora and Terminology: Software for the Translation Programme at Goteborg University, Pernilla Danielson and Daniel Ridings, Goteborg University 3. Parallel and Comparable Bilingual Corpora in Language Teaching and Learning, Carol Peters, CNR, Pisa. 4. COSMAS - a multipurpose system for the exploitation of text corpora, F Bodmer, J Cloeren and R Neumann, Institut fur Deutsche Sprache and Royal Spanish Academy ----------------------------------------------------------------------- 11.00 Refreshments Break ----------------------------------------------------------------------- 11.30 - 13.00: Teaching Languages other than English Using Corpora 1. An Experiment in the Learning of French through Corpus Linguistics, Glyn Holmes, University of Western Ontario 2. A Corpus for Teaching Portuguese, A. Berber Sardinha, University of Liverpool 3. Research into the Functions of Particles in a Corpus, Marta Fernandez-Villaneuva ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 13.00 Lunch ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 14.30-18.00: Workshops (Parallel Sessions) Parallel Workshop Session A Michael Barlow (Rice University) "ParaConc" (14:30 - 16:00) Chris Tribble (Lancaster University): "Developing Corpora for Teaching Purposes" (14:30 - 16:00) Parallel Workshop Session B Philip King, Tim Johns, David Wools (Birmingham University): "The Lingua Project - Parallel Concordancing" (16:00 - 18:00) Knut Hofland, "The ICAME Archive & Concordancing" (Bergen University) (16:00 - 18:00) -------------------------------------------------------------------- 19.00: Dinner -------------------------------------------------------------------- Day Three (11th August) 9.00-11.00: Corpora in Supporting ESP/EAP 1. Encouraging Students to Explore Language and Culture in Early Modern English Pamphlets, Josef Schmied, University of Chemnitz 2. The Ideology of Science as a Collocation: how Corpus Linguistics can Expand the Boundaries of Genre Analysis, Chris Gledhill, Aston University 3. Corpora, Genre Analysis and Dissertation Writing: An Evaluation of the Potential of Corpus-Based Techniques in the Study of Academic Writing, Chris Carne, University of Reading 4. Investigating Grounding Across Narrative and Oral Discourse with Students, Tony Jappy, University of Perpignan ----------------------------------------------------------------------- 11.00: Refreshments ----------------------------------------------------------------------- 11.30 - 13.00: Corpora Supporting Aspects of Language Pedagogy 1. Roberta Facchinetti: The exploration of English diachronic corpora by foreign language students 2. Paul Bowden, Mark Edwards, Peter Halstead and Tony Rose: Knowledge extraction from corpora for pedagogical applications 3. Mary-Ellen Okurowski: Using Authentic Corpora and Language Tools for Adult-Centered Learning ----------------------------------------------------------------------- 13.00 Lunch ----------------------------------------------------------------------- 14.30-16.00: Corpora and Student Writing 1. Exploiting Learner Corpus Data in the Classroom: Form Focused Instruction and Data Driven Learning, Sylviane Granger, Universite Catholique de Louvain 2. Approaching the Assessment of Performance Unit Archive of Schoolchildren's Writing from the Point of View of Corpus Linguistics, M. Shimazumi & A Berber Sardinha, University of Liverpool 3. Teaching L1 and L2 composition in a multicultural environment, Robert Faingold, University of Tulsa. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 16.00: Refreshments ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 16.30-18.00: Special Session on the British National Corpus 16:30 The British National Corpus as a Language Learner Resource, Guy Aston,University of Bologna 17:00 An Introduction to Retrieval from the BNC Using Sara, Lou Burnard, OUCS. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 19.00 Dinner ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 21.00: Software Demonstrations ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Day Four (12th August) 9 am-11.00: Corpus Resources and Systems 1. Teaching Terminology Using Corpora, Jennifer Pearson, Dublin City University 2. A Textual Clues Approach for Generating Metaphors as Explanations by an Intelligent Tutoring System, V. Prince & S. Ferrari, LIMSI-CNRS 3. Designing a CALL System Using Corpora for Speakers of Cantonese, John Milton, City University Hong Kong 4. Marrying VERBALIST to concordance data, John Higgins, University of Stirling ----------------------------------------------------------------------- 11.00: Refreshments ----------------------------------------------------------------------- 11.30-13.00: General Issues in Teaching and Language Corpora II 1. Evaluating Corpora - are we Asking the Right Questions?, Marina Dossena, Bergamo University 2. Corpus Linguistics as an Academic Subject, Ourania Hatzidaki, University of Birmingham 3. A Corpus Based Description of Headline Grammar, John Morley, University of Sienna ----------------------------------------------------------------------- 13.00-14.30: Lunch ----------------------------------------------------------------------- 14.30: Close of Conference ----------------------------------------------------------------------- ======================================================================= TALC96 REGISTRATION. ==================== To register, you may either: 1. Send this form by surface mail to: TALC96, Department of Linguistics and Modern English Language, Lancaster University, Bailrigg, Lancaster LA1 4YT United Kingdom 2. Or fax it to: +44 - 1524 - 843085 3. Or email it to: mcenery@computing.lancaster.ac.uk or mcenery@comp.lancs.ac.uk 4. Or fill in the interactive form on the World Wide Web at the URL http://www.comp.lancs.ac.uk/computing/research/ucrel/talc/ Please register BEFORE 1st June 1996, otherwise we cannot guarantee availability of accommodation. The fee for TALC96 includes the following: Attendance at all TALC96 sessions Conference Pack including Book of Abstracts Accommodation on 9th, 10th, 11th and 12th August Meals: 9th August: afternoon coffee and dinner 10th August: breakfast plus mid-morning coffee, lunch, afternoon coffee and dinner. 11th August: breakfast plus mid-morning coffee, lunch, afternoon coffee and dinner. 12th August: breakfast plus mid-morning coffee, lunch. Accommodation is provided in single study bedrooms on the Lancaster University main campus. Payment Details: Fees are payable in Pounds Sterling or US Dollars. Please make cheques payable to 'Lancaster University'. Sterling money orders can also be used for payment, and must be made payable to 'Lancaster University'. US Dollar cheques are also acceptable, using a fixed exchange rate of 1.5 $US to the Pound. Unfortunately, we cannot accept credit card payments. ================================================================ REGISTRATION FORM ================= Name: _______________________________________________ Title: _______________________________________________ Department: _______________________________________________ Institution/ Organisation: _______________________________________________ Address: _______________________________________________ Postcode/City: _______________________________________________ Country _______________________________________________ Telephone: ____________________________ Fax: ____________________________ Email: ____________________________ Attendance at TALC96 [ ] Residential #225.00 [ ] Student #170.00 [ ] Non-Residential #90.00 [ ] NOTE: Students must provide written evidence of their full time student status, such as an official headed letter from their supervisor. Special dietary requirements: None [ ] Vegetarian [ ] Vegan [ ] Other [ ] Please specify: _______________ ______________________________ Any other comments: ________________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________________ Local Organising Committee Gerry Knowles - Lancaster University, UK Tony McEnery - Lancaster University, UK Anne Wichmann - Central Lancashire University, UK Simon Botley - Lancaster University, UK General Organising Committee Bernhard Kettemann - Graz, AU Lou Burnard - Oxford University, UK Tim Johns - Birmingham University, UK From: Richard Bear Subject: Montagu Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 17:00:29 -0700 (PDT) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 45 (45) Richard Bear, Admissions, has published a new WWW (html) edition of his Selected Prose and Poetry of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu at the URL: <http://darkwing.uoregon.edu/~rbear/montagu.html>. Richard Bear rbear@oregon.uoregon.edu From: Khalid Choukri Subject: ELRA - JOB ADVERTISEMENT FOR A LANGUAGE RESOURCES CONSULTANT Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 08:58:52 -0400 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 46 (46) JOB ADVERTISEMENT FOR A LANGUAGE RESOURCES CONSULTANT (Please forward to whom it may concern and accept our apologies, if you receive this more than once) JOB ADVERTISEMENT FOR A LANGUAGE RESOURCES CONSULTANT The European Language Resources Association (ELRA) was established in February 1995, with the encouragement of the European Commission, to promote the development and exploitation of Language Resources (LR). Language Resources include all data necessary for language engineering, such as monolingual and multilingual lexica, text corpora, speech databases and terminology. The role of the non-profit Association is to promote the production of LR and to collect, validate, and make them available to users. It will gather information on market needs and encourage the Commission and other funding bodies to support the development of the LR most urgently needed. The Association has members drawn from every country in the European Union and expects to attract subscribers from throughout the world. At present, ELRA is financed from membership fees and grants; in the future the Association will derive income from the sale of licences to users world wide. After an initial start-up period of four years, it is planned that the Association will be financially independent and self-supporting. more information about ELRA available from the web: http://www.icp.grenet.fr/ELRA/home.html ELRA is seeking someone to undertake a short-term (3-4 months) full-time temporary contract related to Language Resources identification. The appropriate candidate should be well-established in the field, having a thorough knowledge of the Language Resources (LRs) area. He or she should also be aware of related ongoing projects within the EU, and be willing to devote his or her time to this work. This will carried out in coordination with ELRA experts and under the ELRA's CEO supervision. (Citizenship of, or residency papers for an EU country required) The tasks to be carried out are briefly summarized below. 0. Proposition for a workplan (tasks, budget). 1. Listing the major written corpora and lexicon resources (state of the Art) 2. Contacting potential suppliers to complete / review the list 3. Identifying the technical work that is still to be done (estimating the effort of packaging the data into a marketable product) 4. Ascertaining the legal situation regarding ownership and copyright 5. Negotiating the marketing of such resources through ELRA/ELDA and estimating the revenues/costs-effectiveness. 6. Signing "letter of intent" for such marketing arrangements on behalf of ELRA/ELDA. 7. Reporting to the CEO and handling over all information for contract conclusion with priorities/hierarchies set up regarding the each resources. The work is planned for a period of three months starting by the 20th of May. A list of deliverables should be produced: D1 - A list of LRs suppliers (with identified LRs) to be approached, "letter of intent" sample due 30 May D2 - First progress Report, due 30 June D3 - Second progress Report, due 30 July D4 - Estimates for product collection D5 - Signed letters of intent D4 and D5 are due by September 10th. The sub-contract will be split onto two phases: Phase 1: Tasks 1 and 2, Deliverable D1 Phase 2: Tasks 3 to 7, Deliverables D2 to D7, Compensation: A Basic sub-contract for phase 1 will be concluded and then a second one for phase 2. Compensation will be based on the number of agreements that will be concluded ("bonus performance"). A separate budget will be allowed for Travel expenses. For more information please contact: Khalid CHOUKRI ELRA Executive Director Tel. +33 1 45 86 53 00 Fax. +33 1 45 86 44 88 87, Avenue D'ITALIE, 75013 PARIS Email: elra@calvanet.calvacom.fr Web: http://www.icp.grenet.fr/ELRA/home.html ..................................... From: Bernhard Schroeder Subject: Autumn school of the GLDV, 1996 Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 08:58:42 -0400 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 47 (47) The following announcement of the autumn school of the GLDV in 1996 may be of interest for members of this list. Best wishes, Bernhard Schroeder ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ A N K "U N D I G U N G GLDV Herbschule '96 Herausforderungen an die Computerlinguistik: Multilingualit"at, Multimedialit"at, Multidisziplinarit"at 23. - 27. September 1996 an der Otto-von-Guericke Universit"at Magdeburg ========================================================== Kursangebot: (je Kurs 5 * 1,5 Stunden): Elisabeth Andre' (DFKI Saarbr"ucken): Intelligente multimediale Benutzerschnittstellen John Bateman (GMD Darmstadt): Multilinguale Sprachgenerierung f"ur Informationssysteme Hans Haller (IAI Saarbr"ucken): Kontrollierte Sprache und Tools Roland Hausser (Universit"at Erlangen-N"urnberg): Semantisches Parsing Chris Mellish (Universit"at Edinburgh): Angewandte automatische Generierung von Texten und Hypertexten Dietmar R"osner (Universit"at Magdeburg): Wissensrepr"asentation mit terminologischen Logiken Wir versuchen, vor allem f"ur Studenten aus Osteuropa Stipendien vergeben zu k"onnen. Bitte senden Sie Ihre Bewerbung an uns. Fr"uhanmeldungen bis 30. Juni 1996: Mitglieder der GLDV Nichtmitglieder Studenten: 80,-- DM 100,-- DM Sonstige : 120,-- DM 150,-- DM Anmeldungen nach dem 30. Juni 1996: Mitglieder der GLDV Nichtmitglieder Studenten: 120,-- DM 160,-- DM Sonstige : 140,-- DM 200,-- DM Weitere Informationen, mit u.a. einer Beschreibung der einzelnen Kurse, "Ubernachtungsm"oglichkeiten, Wegbeschreibungen und einem Anmeldeformular werden auf der Homepage der Herbstschule ver"offentlicht: http://www-ai.cs.uni-magdeburg.de/herbstschule96.html Wenn Sie ein Bett in der Jugendherberge reservieren wollen, vermerken Sie dies bitte im Anmeldeformular. ========================================================== Otto-von-Guericke Universit"at Magdeburg Institut f"ur Informations- und Kommunikationssysteme Prof. Dr. Dietmar R"osner Universit"atsplatz 2 D-39106 Magdeburg tel: +49/391/67-1 87 18 fax: +49/391/67-1 20 18 email: herbstschule@iik.cs.uni-magdeburg.de www: http://www-ai.cs.uni-magdeburg.de/herbstschule96.html From: Dr Christiane Rahner Subject: art history on the WWW Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 15:41:52 GMT +0200 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 48 (48) To all who have been so kind to send me information: many thanks for your help! Christiane Rahner From: "A. E. B. Coldiron" Subject: X-Post: Milton Transcription Project Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 16:44:33 -0400 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 49 (49) Dear HUMANIST Readers, As John Milton wrote in _Areopagitica_, "a good Booke is the pretious life-blood of a master spirit, imbalm'd and treasur'd up on purpose to a life beyond life." THE MILTON TRANSCRIPTION PROJECT is dedicated to assuring that all of Milton's poetry and prose will be available for public access on the Internet. Although most of Milton's poetry will soon become available at the Oxford Text Archive and at the University of Richmond server, most of the English and Latin prose--along with a great deal of fascinating Miltoniana-- remains to be transcribed. We invite you to join us in providing accurate scholarly transcriptions of these texts. THE MILTON TRANSCRIPTION PROJECT (MTP), currently supported by Milton-L, _Milton Quarterly_, the Computer Writing and Research Laboratory at the University of Texas at Austin, _EMLS_, and the University of Richmond's web-server, is the joint creation of volunteers from 24 colleges and universities in three countries. Volunteers may transcribe as much or as little as they wish; each transcription will be proofread, formatted, checked, and refereed. We shall acknowledge any significant contribution, and all accepted transcriptions will be credited by name. In order to volunteer, to view test sites, or to receive other information, please contact either Professor Hugh Wilson (MTP, Editor; dithw@ttacs.ttu.edu) or Professor A.E.B. Coldiron, (MTP, Internet Liaison; aec2b@virginia.edu). The only requirements are diligence, concern for accuracy, and the ability to type with one or more fingers. Volunteer: earn the intangible reward of "those whose publisht labours advance the good of mankind" (_Areopagitica_, 1644). From: Andrea Nixon Subject: History/Philosophy of Technology Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 09:41:06 -0600 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 50 (50) Does anyone on the list know of work that is being done in the fields of either the history of technology or the philosophy of technology that directly relates to computing in the humanities? I am looking for work focused on the implications of the use of information technologies in the humanities. Sincerely, Andrea Nixon anixon@carleton.edu From: Steve Taylor Subject: TACT guides Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 11:58:43 -0400 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 51 (51) A colleague has begun using the text-analysis program TACT, but has found the documentation to be inadequate. Does anyone know of any third-party guide for using TACT? Steve Taylor Faculty Information Technology Center Emory University (404)727-8931 http://userwww.service.emory.edu/~ussjt/ From: Subject: Re: 10.22 annual reviews online? Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 52 (52) A query on a minor point about the on-line, html review, quoted here: [deleted quotation] Why would HTML "materially increase the labor for the person being reviewed"? Glenn Everett Academic Affairs Faculty Fellow University of Tennessee at Martin aaff@utm.edu From: Subject: hiatus Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 53 (53) Your editor will be away from his usual haunts from Friday afternoon until Monday evening, and although computers and the Internet will doubtless be within reach, he is unlikely to have the time to use them on Humanist. Your messages will of course be safe on the Princeton server, but it will not be speaking to you until sometime on Tuesday. Humanists have always been great talkers. The occasional meditative silence -- does it make the chatter more welcome? Meanwhile, for your entertainment I have put on the Web something that I found among my papers while I was sorting the transatlantic-worthy from the unworthy last night. It is an essay on how to survive contrary arguments ("factifuging", or fact-fleeing), for which I have the name of the author but no other information. If anyone recognizes the piece, I'd be grateful to know more. Enjoy Nathan S. Kline, M.D., "Factifuging", at the URL http://www.princeton.edu/~mccarty/misc/factifuging.html Fleeing the scene but not the facts, WM From: Gustav Bayerle Subject: Re: 10.26 the polyglot @ Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 07:48:23 -0500 (EST) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 54 (54) In Hungarian @ is called _kukac_ "worm." From: Florian T Brody Subject: Re: 10.19 @ = Affenschwanz, Klammeraffe, a commercial, arroba, Strudel, apestaartje, slingeraap, arobace -- FULL STOP! Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 20:57:38 +0100 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 55 (55) as much as the & sign which as everybody knows is early latin shorthand for "et" is known in German, the @-sign is unknown and was introduced but the 7-bit IBM char set which had nothing but A..Z,0..9, and a few US style special chars such as #@ | As Rainer Henrich points out @ is called "Klammeraffe" - was called "Klammeraffe" until approx a year ago - now everybody (everybody who reads at least a tabloid) knows that it is the "Internet sign" - nobody who wants to be cool can do without and logos, mugs, T-Shirts everything has an "@" instead of an "a" wherever possible. even peope who claim that they use email regularily don't know how to draw the @ - observe people who they desperately make an "a" and then try to go around clockwise - change their mind midstream and go the other way around .... Another sign: the "#" which I know as "Doppelkreuz" in German (double cross) is sometimes referred as "Kanalgitter" (sewer cover/grid - the one on street corners to let the rain water run down). And in one glossary it was explained as Octothorp - unfortunately I never found a second reference to this. I really like the word and use it whenever there is a half way reasonable chance to do so - which is not very often :) anybody who knows more about this? Florian Brody MultimediaArt, Salzburg, Austria Art Center College of Design, Pasadenas CA and currently Universidad de Las Palmas de Gran Canaria From: Subject: Orlandi on theory and practice of MS encoding Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 56 (56) Many thanks to Tito Orlandi for calling our attention (in Humanist 10.1.1 of 7 May 1996) to his paper "Teoria e prassi della codifica dei manoscritti" at http://rmcisadu.let.uniroma1.it/~orlandi/encod.html. This paper is very much to the point, as regards the theory of encoding and its practical implications, and I recommend it to anyone interested in the field. If I may trespass a bit on the patience of those who are not thus interested in the field, I'd like to respond here to some issues raised by Orlandi's essay. In particular, I like Orlandi's attempt to bring order to the problem by distinguishing systematically the 'ideal text', the 'virtual text', and the 'material text' (testo ideale, testo virtuale, testo materiale), which correspond approximately with what I would call the authorial conception, the text as an abstract linguistic/cultural object, and the book or witness to the text. Orlandi usefully applies some basic semiotic thinking to the theory of encoding and the practical implications of that theory. In one point, however, I wonder whether Orlandi is not dismissing too quickly the position taken by Ian Lancashire in his postings to Humanist last December. Orlandi says in his concluding paragraph: Tuttavia, quale che sia lo scopo che ci si propone, la codifica su supporto magnetico non è la codifica del testo materiale, ma quella del testo virtuale, che si ottiene esaminando il testo materiale alla luce della competenza di chi lo ha prodotto. Solo questo permetterà di identificare tutti gli elementi singoli, atomici, che formerrano l'oggetto della codifica, e di formulare una tabella convenzionale di corrispondenza fra i codici, cioè i simboli della codifica, e quegli elementi. At any rate, whatever scope be proposed for the encoding of a text, encoding in magnetic form is not the encoding of the material text, but that of the virtual text, which is obtained by examining the material text in the light of the competence of the creator. Only the encoding of the virtual text will make it possible to identify all the individual, atomic elements which will form the object of encoding, and to formulate a conventional table of correspondences between the tags, i.e. the symbols of the encoding, and those elements. (my translation, take with grain of salt) This seems to me a perfectly acceptable approach, in many cases. But it does present some problems for those readers faced with material texts (MSS, inscriptions in the stone of ancient ruins, ...) which we do *not* wholly understand, and from which can reconstruct only partially the virtual text. Sometimes, we can understand nothing at all. In practice, it seems to me, we tend to do two things in such cases: * in editions, we record as much detail of the physical state of the original artefact as seems (a) economically feasible and (b) potentially significant -- by means of detailed transcription, or by images of the artefact, or both * we retain the original artefact in a museum, archive, or library, in order that it can be consulted in cases of need. If we can *partially* unravel the virtual text, then we need an electronic representation which will * allow us to express our understanding of the virtual text (such as it is, given the faulty state of the material text and our own faulty competence) as far as possible * allow us to record as much of the material manifestation of the text as we think *might be* significant. I believe Prof. Lancashire is concerned in part with such situations, and it is difficult to dismiss entirely the desire to record the material conditions of the text in such cases. Even in cases where we think we understand a (virtual) text satisfactorily, the historical vicissitudes of text transmission by print and manuscript do text to encourage the multiplication of text versions -- and oral tradition is even more prolific of variation. And the material transmission of the text is itself an object of study, even for those of us with an 'allographic' understanding of the text. And therefore it is necessary that scholarship possess a method of encoding which can record *both* the virtual text *and* its historically important material manifestations. In this sense, I have to agree that one of Prof. Lancashire's premises is correct, even while the other one (the claim that the TEI *requires* a focus on the virual text and *forbids* the encoding of the material text) is false. It is perhaps worth pointing out, however, that recording the material manifestation of a text when we do not understand it is fraught with risks: if we don't understand the text, then we cannot guarantee that our recording of the text's material manifestation will capture its every significant aspect. We are likely to lose something which later analysts will think bears meaning -- just as Thomas Johnson, the editor of Emily Dickinson, may possibly have lost significant distinctions in her punctuation despite his very conservative transcription policies. (At least one later scholar says the marks transcribed by Johnson as dashes are rhetorical marks for rising, sustained, or falling tones, and need to be transcribed as at least three distinct symbols.) Equally to the point, the risks of omission are not limited to texts we are conscious of not understanding. There are no detectable limits to the ingenuity of scholarship in drawing inferences from texts and the circumstances of their transmission, so there is no detectable limit to the set of features which *might* be significant in some context or other, or under some analytical microscope or other. From this I draw the inference that *any* representation of a text, like any representation of any object, is likely to lose some information: Representations are inevitably partial, never disinterested; inevitably they reveal their authors' conscious and unconscious judgments and biases. Representations obscure what they do not reveal, and without them nothing can be revealed at all. ("Text in the Electronic Age," L&LC 6.1 (1991): 34) This is one reason the notion of extensibility is built so deep into the TEI Guidelines. Under the circumstances, it is futile to expect any encoding of the physical manifestations of a text to be complete, just as it is futile to expect the physical manifestation to exhaust the significance of the virtual text, still less of the ideal text. All that can be expected by later users, and all that can be hoped for by encoders, is that an encoding capture without excessive distortion some of the features of a text the encoders believe they understand. As Orlandi says (in private correspondence): All in all: we can encode only what we understand; and what we do not understand, may be reproduced and communicated by means of analogical rather than digital devices, so photography, autopsy, etc. Or more precisely: by means of devices used analogically, including digital images etc. (Even this may be too optimistic: analogical reproductions lose information, too, because they choose some features of the original, rather than others, for reproduction.) Many thanks again for Tito Orlandi for this paper. Best regards, C. M. Sperberg-McQueen From: Paul Brians Subject: annual review in html Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 07:56:44 -0700 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 57 (57) Glenn Everett wrote: [deleted quotation] I don't know about you, but I'm pretty fluent in html and use various translation tools but it still takes me time to translate documents from Microsoft Word format to html. For someone less experienced it could be a truly daunting chore. I look forward to Microsoft Assistant for the Mac (the only thing that might persuade me to upgrade to Word 6.0). Paul Brians, Department of English,Washington State University Pullman, WA 99164-5020 brians@wsu.edu http://www.wsu.edu:8080/~brians From: "touched by the tangled love of poets." Subject: tact Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 14:35:24 -0500 (EST) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 58 (58) If I remember correctly, though TACT is freeware, the copyright for the manual is held by MLA. And they have taken their own sweet time in releasing it. However, last I heard, it is intended to come out very soon-- perhaps even this summer. -john drummond ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- john garnett drummond................"Omar"*| drummojg@jmu.edu "a man is rich in proportion to the number *| help_john@jmu.edu of things he can afford to let alone" -hdt *| http://falcon.jmu.edu/~drummojg/ ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- From: "C. Perry Willett" Subject: Re: 10.27 queries Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 08:08:10 -0500 (EST) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 59 (59) LETRS (The Library Electronic Text Resource Center) at Indiana University has a collection of guides to electronic texts and tools (including one for TACT) available on its web pages at: http://www.indiana.edu/~letrs/text-tools/softwareoverview.html> Perry Willett Main Library Indiana University PWILLETT@indiana.edu From: Tom Walsh (92) Subject: Star Tribune Guest Editorial Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 60 (60) Star Tribune, May 12, 1996, p. A27 Killing tenure would be foolish Regent's plan sure to further damage U By Fennell Evans and Ellen Berscheid The University of Minnesota's Board of Regents is trying to change its employment contracts with the faculty. If it succeeds, it will do irreparable damage to the university, the state's economy, and the taxpayers. Regent Jean Keffeler claims that a change in faculty contracts to allow the dismissal of tenured faculty is necessary to give the regents greater "economic flexibility" and greater freedom to "shape" the university. The regents seem to view the university as a has-been and also-ran in the national sweepstakes the states are running to improve their research universities to fuel their economies. The attack on faculty already is "shaping" the university. Many first rate scholars have resigned, others are seeking employment elsewhere, and searches for new faculty are discovering that top scholars from other institutions are now reluctant to consider the University of Minnesota. The brain drain is a direct result of the regents' view of faculty as a financial liability-not as the economic asset most national universities believe their faculties to be. Repeated requests for detailed financial information supporting the regents' economic logic have been met with the glib statement that because personnel account for 80 percent of the university's budget, changing the standard faculty contract will help solve the university's financial problems. It is true that 80 percent of the university's budget involves personnel. But only 11 percent of personnel are faculty. Faculty not only have become few in number compared to other personnel, the faculty is significantly smaller than the faculties of comparable universities. Faculty compensation thus accounts for a relatively small portion of the university's budget. In 1994-95, the university's total budget was $1.6 billion. Total faculty compensation was $271 million, of which only $191 million came from state appropriations--the remainder was raised by the faculty themselves from research and other activities, a leveraging of faculty salaries typical of research universities. In sum, state-supported faculty compensation constitutes only 12 percent--not 80 percent--of the university's budget. In return for an investment of $191 million in their salaries, the faculty raised $350 million in external research funds alone. This money generated 10,000 Minnesota jobs and supported the university's graduate programs and other activities. It is also the faculty, of course, who bring in the lion's share of the tuition revenue and on whom the academic reputation of the university depends. This is why other national universities regard their faculties as revenue-generating engines. And it is just one reason why they make the retention and recruitment of top faculty their highest priority. The regents' careless disregard for the role of faculty in the financial survival of a national university is not only reflected in their effort to weaken tenure, but also in compensation policies that have ranked University of Minnesota faculty near the bottom of the national universities for many years. This year is typical. Community college and state university faculty are scheduled to receive a 4 percent salary increase. University civil service and other bargaining unit personnel (not Twin Cities faculty) will receive a 4.5 percent increase, resulting in a $17 million increased budgetary burden. Only a 2 percent increase has been proposed for University of Minnesota faculty, increasing the state's contribution to faculty salaries by $3.6 million. Contrast that $3.6 million to the $17 million for other personnel and to the $59 million the university spent last year on outside "consultants," including platoons of lawyers. Tougher to keep top faculty Meanwhile, the university's trajectory of decline in academic reputation has made it increasingly difficult to attract and retain top faculty. In 1975, the university was ranked 12th nationally as an academic institution. It had fallen to 16th by 1985, and, in 1995, careful analysis revealed that it had slipped into the third tier, to a rank of 21. Competitors such as the University of California at Berkeley and the University of Wisconsin are sending resolutions of support for Minnesota faculty on the one hand while raiding Minnesota's faculty on the other. These universities have resisted tampering with freedom of inquiry. And they have read the forecasts showing that over the next 10 years, large numbers of faculty at all universities will retire and the fierce competition to attract top faculty will escalate. In the name of economizing, Keffeler and the regents' personnel sub-committee have lit a match to the already flammable faculty tinderbox. It has started the entire Board of Regents on a dangerous experiment to see whether a state that increasingly depends on high-technology manufacturing, value-added services and a highly educated work force can continue to prosper in the absence of a major national university. And it is inflicting another crippling blow to a once great university in its long and losing struggle against mediocrity and national oblivion. We appeal to the university's Alumni Association to rise once again to the defense of the university's future. We also appeal to the Legislature, the guardian of the state's almost 150 years of investment in the university, to protect that investment. And we appeal to the regents who have not yet formed an opinion to consider carefully the faculty's role in the financial dynamics of the university as well as the impact that a further decline in the university will have on the future of the state Fennell Evans is director of the University of Minnesota's Center for Interfacial Engineering. Ellen Berscheid is regents' professor ofpsychology in the university's College of Liberal Arts. From: Jim Marchand Subject: Affenschwanz, etc. Date: Fri, 17 May 96 14:20:25 CST X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 61 (61) The names which we give to the squiggles we put on paper are often quite evanescent, even names of letters of the alphabet. Cf. E. S. Sheldon, "The Origin of the English Names of the Letters of the Alphabet," Studies and Notes in Philology and Literature 1 (1892), 66-87; _____, "Further Notes on the Names of the Letters," Studies, etc. II (1893), 155-171; Max Hermann Jellinek, "Der Aussprache des Lateinischen und deutsche Buchstabennamen," Wiener Sitzungsberichte, Phil.-hist. Kl. 212, vol. 2 (1932). Anyone who followed the name `haitch' for `aitch' (= h), or Harry Truman's `from a to izzard' would know this. Indeed, even today, there is little uniformity in names for such things as # (number, cross-hatch, cross-double-bar [as in Smith and Trager's `cross-double-bar-juncture']). The ampersand is in origin an etc ligature, the @ an a with a t over it (there was also an _ut_ sign for printers doing Latin). What to call ligatures was always a problem. As to @, when I worked as a clerk in Germany in the late 40's, we said Kreis-a, and I feel that Affenschwanz has a definite derogatory bent. In late 1940's German, BTW, anything preceded by Ammi- had a bad connotation, so we often called it Ammi-a (you could also spell it Ami-). Even attempts to give names to the signs of the phonetic alphabet are doomed to failure in some areas: Geoffrey K. Pullum and William A. Ladusaw, _Phonetic Symbol Guide_ (U Chicago Press, 1986), 65, call the "Gothic" sign for [hw] `H-V Ligature', which it certainly is not, and which has a long and venerable tradition of being called `The Collitz Letter,' it having been invented by Hermann Collitz, of blessed memory. I note that they call # `Number Sign', in spite of Smith and Trager. Trema they call umlaut, though it is found above e, for example. It would be nice if we had some uniformity. Maybe ISO could take it up. At present, when asked `What is @ called in X?' answer `many things'. To those who want to have _period_ used only to mean `full stop', I say vsevo khoroshiva `luck to you'. Jim Marchand. From: Jim Campbell Subject: Re: 10.31 polyglot @ and the double-crossed octothorpe Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 18:56:12 -0400 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 62 (62) I've found the discussion of words for @ and other signs fascinating, but most of it has wandered away from the original poster's question. A few people have told us that "at" is a common way of speaking @ in an email address, but could some of the other respondents go back to the question and tell us how an e-mail address is spoken in their languages? That is, in American English I would say campbell@virginia.edu as campbell at virginia dot e d u How would you tell a colleague your email address in your language? - Jim Campbell (campbell@virginia.edu) From: "Iain D. Brown" <100131.3564@CompuServe.COM> Subject: Now available: "Beyond the Book: Theory, Culture and the Politics of Cyberspace" Date: 18 May 96 09:24:35 EDT X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 63 (63) PUBLICATION NOW AVAILABLE A while ago mention was made on SHARP of "Beyond the Book: Theory, Culture and the Politics of Cyberspace" (editors: Warren Chernaik, Marilyn Deegan and Andrew Gibson), to be published by the Centre for English Studies and the Office for Humanities Communication (Oxford) following a 1995 conference organised by the CES and OHC. I am pleased to inform you all that this book is now available for purchase. Looking through my copy which I picked up yesterday, I notice there are some excellent essays, including the following: Kathryn Sutherland, "Looking and knowing: textual encounters of a postponed kind" George Landow, "We are already beyond the book" John Pickering, "Hypermedia: when will they feel natural?" Michael Allen, "Re-viewing the film (studies) text" Laura Cherniak, "The Web, semiotics, and history: Samual Delany's imagined worlds" Andrew Gibson, "Interactive fiction and narrative space" Nina Wakeford, "Sexualized bodies in cyberspace" Copies of "Beyond the Book" may be ordered direct from the Centre for English Studies, Room 363, Senate House, Malet Street, London WC1E 7HU, UK. Cost per copy is L7.50 plus postage (L1, UK; 2, Europe; L3 elsewhere). Cheques, drawn in pounds sterling, should be made payable to the University of London. Further enquiries to Rebecca Dawson at the CES. Tel. (+44) (0)171 636 8000 ext. 3054 Fax (+44) (0)171 436 4533 e-mail: r.dawson@sas.ac.uk ***Also available from the CES are details of the University of London's MA in the History of the Book. This message is being cross-posted to HUMANIST. From: LDC Office Subject: Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 08:24:24 -0400 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 64 (64) Announcing a NEW RELEASE from the LINGUISTIC DATA CONSORTIUM Radio Broadcast News Continuous Speech Recognition Corpus (Hub-4) This set of CD-ROMs contains all of the speech data provided to sites participating in the DARPA CSR November 1995 Hub-4 (Radio) Broadcast News tests. The data consists of digitized waveforms of MarketPlace (tm) business news radio shows provided by KUSC through an agreement with the Linguistic Data Consortium, and detailed transcriptions of those broadcasts. The software NIST used to process and score the output of the test systems is also included. The data is organized as follows: CD26-1: Training Data-Ten complete half-hour broadcasts with minimally-verified transcripts. The transcripts are time aligned with the waveforms at the story-boundary level. CD26-2: Development-Test Data-Six complete half-hour broadcasts with verified transcripts. The transcripts are time aligned with the waveforms at the story-and turn-boundary level. Index files have been included which specify how the data may be partitioned into 2 test sets. CD26-6 Evaluation-Test Data-Five complete half-hour broadcasts with verified/adjudicated transcripts. The transcripts are time aligned with the waveforms at the story-, turn-, and music-boundary level. An index file has been included which specifies how the data was partitioned into the test set used in the CSR 1995 Hub-4 tests. Institutions that have membership in the LDC during the 1996 Membership Year will be able to receive a copy of the Radio Broadcast News at no additional charge, in the same manner as all other text and speech corpora published by the LDC. Nonmembers can receive a copy of this corpus for research purposes only for a fee of $2500. If you would like to order a copy of this corpus, please email your request to ldc@unagi.cis.upenn.edu. If you need additional information before placing your order, or would like to inquire about membership in the LDC, please send email or call (215) 898-0464. Further information about the LDC and its available corpora can be accessed on the Linguistic Data Consortium WWW Home Page at URL http://www.cis.upenn.edu/~ldc. Information is also available via ftp at ftp.cis.upenn.edu under pub/ldc; for ftp access, please use "anonymous" as your login name, and give your email address when asked for password. From: Subject: conference announcement Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 65 (65) Institute for Social Research The University of Kent at Canterbury CONFERENCE MORALS OF LEGITIMACY - RESPONSIBILITY, AUTHORITY AND TRUST IN CONTEMPORARY SOCIETY 18-19 September 1996 Convenor: Italo Pardo The aim of the conference is to address the difficulty in linking legal and political responsibility to authority and trust in the exercise of power. The basic assumption is that serious handling of this issue must be based on a constructive understanding of the micro-level, as opposed to abstract thinking per se. In this belief, the conference brings together ethnographic analysis from Europe and outside it to study the significance of the different morals of legitimacy that coexist in civil society to the interplay between the production (and practice) of law - intended as a contested metaphor of social order, the establishment of legal and political authority, and the dynamics of citizens' trust in the institutions and representatives of the state. Contributions Ray Abrahams (University of Cambridge) - State jurisdiction and community morality: crime control when the state fails. John Fitzpatrick (University of Kent) - The legalization of everyday life: an exploration of the implications of the policing of neighbour disputes. Peter Fitzpatrick (University of Kent) - Appropriating Law: Hybridity and the peasant corporation. Caroline Humphrey (University of Cambridge) - Ethics of mass 'business' in contemporary Russia. Italo Pardo (University of Kent) - Citizens, distrusted politicians, rampant magistrates: political and jurisprudential moralities in Italy. Jonathan Parry (London School of Economics) - The moral and the corrupt: a case-study from Central India. Giuliana Prato (University of Kent) - The cherries of the Mayor: degrees of morality and responsibility in local Italian administration. Michael Rowlands (University College London) - Borders and mistrust in relation to immigrants' status in Europe. Paul Stirling (University of Kent) - Law, moral authority and social control: parables from Turkey. Further particulars are available from Dr Italo Pardo, Department of Sociology and Social Anthropology, Eliot College, The University, Kent CT2 7NS; Tel. 01227 764000 ext 3632; Fax 01227 827289; e-mail i.pardo@ukc.ac.uk Booking forms are available from Mrs Jan Horn, The Institute for Social Research, Eliot College, The University, Canterbury, Kent CT2 7NS; Tel. 01227 764000; Fax 01227 827289; e-mail dossa-office@ukc.ac.uk From: Glenn Everett Subject: Re: html-ized annual reviews Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 11:51:05 -0500 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 66 (66) Paul Brians wrote, in answer to my question, 'Why would HTML "materially increase the labor for the person being reviewed"?' [deleted quotation] I have some reluctance to extend this discussion of a minor point further, but perhaps some clarification is warranted. If the sole purpose is to make the text of the review documents available on the 'net, ASCII versions of word-processed files can be posted either to a gopher or web site. True, special fonts will be lost, but the text and the basic formatting can be preserved. But perhaps plain ASCII files are not satisfactory. Glenn Everett Academic Affairs Faculty Fellow University of Tennessee at Martin aaff@utm.edu From: Russon Wooldridge Subject: Re: 10.17 conference on mad science (IVCMS'96) Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 08:25:10 -0400 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 67 (67) Willard McCarty asks "what would a mad humanist be like?" One suggestion (with at least local relevance): someone who tries to persuade the university's administration to add substance to its public rhetoric about "the importance of the Humanities". Russon Wooldridge ------------ Russon Wooldridge, Department of French, Trinity College, University of Toronto, Toronto M5S 1H8, Canada Tel: 1-416-978-2885 -- Fax: 1-416-978-4949 E-mail: wulfric@chass.utoronto.ca Internet: http://www.chass.utoronto.ca:8080/~wulfric/ From: Subject: Humanist messages numbering Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 68 (68) [In response to the following, I have changed my stubborn practice. Objections? --WM] Willard, it's trivial: could you set the Humanist messages numbering so that when ordering the messages by subject they'd go in the correct sequence? Now, numbering them with 10.1, 10.2, ..., 10.10, 10.11 the ascii ordering by subject gives 10.1, 10.10, 10.11, ... 10.2, ... that's obviously wrong. Ordering the messages by date doesn't help because of non sequential messages delivery. Before that, the numbering used the template x.yyyy with trailing zeroes as needed: it was more usable. Do you think it's possible to restart with the old template? Thanks. Maurizio Maurizio Lana -- lana@cisi.unito.it -- lana@tecnetdati.it <><> My opinions are mine. Le mie opinioni sono mie. =>CISI, Universita' di Torino Via S. Ottavio 20, 10124 Torino, Italy <> http://www.cisi.unito.it/arachne/arachne.html =>Tecnet Dati, Via Legnano 27, 10128 Torino, Italy <> http://www.espero.it/tecnetdati/chitecne.htm From: Geoffrey Rockwell Subject: Re: 10.29 annual review; TACT Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 10:23:48 -0500 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 69 (69) On learning TACT: While it is not a manual for TACT, users may want to try the online workbook for TACTweb. This was designed to teach students about text analysis and prepare them for TACT should they continue to a higher level course. The URL is: http://tactweb.humanities.mcmaster.ca/tactweb/home.htm If you want your students to use this you may want to set up your own TACTweb server rather than point them at ours. We do not watch it closely except when a course is using it. Yours, Geoffrey Rockwell From: Russon Wooldridge Subject: Re 10.29 TACT Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 08:24:42 -0400 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 70 (70) john drummond asks about the latest on TACT. An official memorandum dated 9 May 1996 from the CHASS Information Office (the CHASS Facility -- Computing in the Humanities & Social Sciences -- replaced the Centre for Computing in the Humanities at the University of Toronto on 1 May 1996 [N.B. "Centre" -> "Facility"!]) informs the reader that "CHASS no longer distributes the TACT program. However, the program may be downloaded via the Internet at: http:///www.chass.utoronto.ca:8080/cch/tact.html" Thus the information given by LETRS (The Library Electronic Text Resource Center) at Indiana University (Humanist 10.29) is accurate. The same CHASS memorandum adds: "You may also contact the MLA who publishes the manual: Modern Language Association of America 10 Astor Place, New York, NY 10003-6981, U.S.A. Tel: 1-212-475-9500; Sales: 1-800-955-8275 [this number presumably works only in North-America]; Technical Support: 1-212-614-6302; Fax: 1-919-515-2682" As far as I know (I am part-author of the manual), the manual has not yet appeared. Russon Wooldridge ------------ Russon Wooldridge, Department of French, Trinity College, University of Toronto, Toronto M5S 1H8, Canada Tel: 1-416-978-2885 -- Fax: 1-416-978-4949 E-mail: wulfric@chass.utoronto.ca Internet: http://www.chass.utoronto.ca:8080/~wulfric/ From: Subject: The emperor's clothes: item for debate? Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 71 (71) MN DAILY 5/20/96 EDITORIAL/OPINIONS How U professors aren't pulling their weight By Jim Gardner Reporting on the Faculty Senate meeting last month, a writer for the Star Tribune noted that the regents want to change the tenure code at the University and cut salaries when "professors aren't pulling their weight" (Metro, April 19). Like many legislators, the regents are concerned that tenure is being abused to protect unproductive faculty at the University. How can the University clear away its dead wood without jeopardizing tenure? Quite simply, it can restore the high standards of its once-famous College of Liberal Arts. The phrase "dead wood" automatically calls an image of aged professors who drone on in the classroom for six hours a week and then retreat to lakefront cabins with four months of paid vacation. But, in fact, many professors turn into dead wood as soon as they get tenure, even though some of them continue to be popular in a classroom of undergraduates. Academics die professionally when they lose their motivation for creative scholarship. Minnesotans generally understand that a university must give its professors a light course load so they can devote 50 hours a week to the teaching that matters most: disseminating their knowledge and spreading the fame of their research institution. By imparting their scholarship to colleagues internationally, professors make the whole world their classroom. To this end, tenure is indispensable. Its defenders sometimes forget, however, that tenure does not relieve professors of responsibility for communicating their research. To put it bluntly, professors who do not publish deserve to perish. They aren't pulling their weight as scholars . In CLA, most faculty accept the responsibility that University status brings, but they are wary of letting administrators tell them what research they can do. Tenure protects a scholar from the arbitrary decisions by a regent like Jean Keffeler or a provost like William Brody, both of whom apparently want to turn the University into a technical school and run it as a business. In their view, the University's mission is to train students for the workplace; therefore, any course at the University that does not lead directly to a vocation is worthless, and one is supposed to study history or nursing or music for the same reason -- to get a job. This warped measure of CLA as a vocational institute will not be rectified so long as the administrators themselves are at a loss to explain what makes a productive scholar in history or in the humanities. Even some of the deans have trouble distinguishing cultural and historical scholarship in the humanities from quantifiable, scientific research -- for example, the CLA dean who was replaced in January. This dean, a professor from the clinical sciences, was smart and fair, but hadn't a clue about to how to evaluate published research in the humanities. In physics or statistics, research gets published in the form of articles, or in papers read at national conferences. Scientists and social scientists make their contributions to "knowledge" with these papers. Biologists or economists seldom write books unless they mean to popularize the subject. The situation is exactly reversed in the humanities and history. In these fields, the sole badge of professional research is a book or a scholarly edition (of a play by Shakespeare, for example). An article barely scratches the surface of the humanities, whose timeless contents are best illuminated by the sweep and power of an original monograph. New discoveries in the humanities are few and far between. Sometimes an unknown document or artifact turns up, and it can be reported in an article, just like any scientific finding. But normally, doing research in the humanities means piecing together facts that have long been known and giving them an original interpretation. To convince colleagues that a familiar ocument makes better sense when read in a new context, a humanities professor needs full command of the established facts and their traditional interpretation. This requires lengthy argument with other scholars, a dialogue that is possible only in a book. A scholar in the humanities is rightly suspicious of articles. Their brief scope will not accommodate "cutting-edge" research. Legislators point out that CLA has lost rank in the national standings. The problem is not the quantity of the CLA's scholarship, but its quality. What seems to have happened is a growing number of CLA's professors -- perhaps 20 percent of its 500 faculty -- have taken to mimicking their colleagues in the sciences by writing articles instead of books. Quality is hurt also when a CLA professor gathers together articles that are the work of somebody else and cobbles them into a loose "publication" to swell the professor's own resume. Collective scholarship in the humanities cannot hope to imitate the team projects of the sciences and social sciences. It fails because the goal of science -- to "discover" knowledge -- clashes with the aim of the humanities, which is to "interpret" it. Interpreting history and the humanities has always been a job for the individual. That is not likely to change. When a team of humanities professors try to combine their individual interpretations, they wind up generating truisms. In the humanities, a publication that has no author lacks authority. In the typical case, a humanities professor collects articles written by others and "piggybacks" them in an anthology with a preface. Such piggybacking, if it is up-to-date, can provide a kind of forum to highlight an unresolved problem. But it cannot provide a solution -- the authoritative" interpretation that gives integrity to the best research in the humanities. The deans neglect to distinguish between original research and piggyback scholarship when they apply a quantitative yardstick to publication in CLA. They appoint bean-counting Promotion and Tenure Committees who log piggyback work as "scholarly activity" and use it to justify promotions. As a consequence, piggyback scholarship has become a professional embarrassment to the University, and CLA's reputation in the academic world has plummeted. Piggyback scholarship thrives alongside true research in the largest departments of CLA. For example, the Department of English has on its roster (excluding the professors of creative writing) 32 tenured professors. The handbook of the department's Graduate Studies Office notes that over the past 14 years, those professors have among them published 42 book-length works. Three books a year sounds very respectable, until you examine the titles. Only half of them are authored books. Of the other publications, fully a dozen are piggyback scholarship: spineless anthologies, picayune bibliographies, interviews and diaries tricked out as patchwork research. The department's authored books, on the one hand, cover a wide range of subjects: from "Beowulf" to "Brave New World," from Shakespeare to Ira Gershwin, from Chaucer and 18th century philosophy to Freud and detective fiction. These monographs bring credit to one of the stronger research departments in the college. But the piggyback titles, ranging from a bibliography on writing with word processors to collections of incest narratives and status reports on feminists in academe, serve merely to advertise the dilettantism of CLA professors. Piggyback scholarship looks specialized and sounds new, but it should not pass for research in CLA. Minnesota deserves professors who are pulling their weight, and if the administration balks at restoring national standards to the University, the Legislature should act. While preserving tenure, they ought to insist that the publication of all tenured professors be reviewed and their salaries adjusted to reflect significant scholarship: not parochial activity, but the genuine research that alone brings a university national recognition. Jim Gardner is a former Ph.D. candidate in the College of Liberal Arts and has authored several communications manuals. From: Subject: Re: 10.040 change in Humanist message numbering? Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 72 (72) [The following concerns the new (or, rather, return to the old) practice of numbering Humanist messages with leading zeroes to accommodate the failures of unintelligent sorting. --WM] On Mon, 20 May 1996 22:32:40 -0400 (EDT) you said: [deleted quotation] In order to prevent your receiving *only* objections, and falling prey to a fallacious inference, let me register not objection but approval. -Michael From: Subject: Posting Literature Texts Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 73 (73) Dear Colleagues, A student of mine is just about to complete her master's thesis. This project includes a modern-spelling text of John Donne's prose satire _Ignatius His Conclave_. It occurred to me that it might be helpful to make this text accessible via the Web, especially since no other version of the text is currently available. However, I do not have a Web page myself and have little practical knowledge in posting anything to the Web. Ideally I would like to place the text on a page that features other texts from the English Renaissance, and ideally I would also like her to be mentioned in a line crediting her work. Does anyone have any suggestions about what to do next? The text is currently formatted in WORDPERFECT 5.1. Would conversion to HTML be difficult from this format? Please forgive questions that probably seem hopelessly naive to people who know much more about computing that I do. Thanks, though, for any assistance. Robert C. (Bob) Evans bobevans@strudel.aum.edu From: Brad Inwood Subject: Re: 10.036 more on tenure Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 10:39:17 -0400 (EDT) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 74 (74) Jim Gardner's opinion piece on humanities scholarship is well-timed and welcome. But his views about the value of articles as opposed to books in the humanities seem extreme. Sure, scientists and social sciences publish more articles and virtually no books -- for some of the reasons he adduces. But I don't know anyone who thinks as he does that the article is an intrinsically inferior form of scholarship or that cutting edge research in the humanities cannot be accommodated in that form. In the fields I know well (Classics and History of Philosophy) such a view would be absurdly out of touch with reality, and in other areas where I am less in touch I doubt it is much different. This is an important issue: differences in disciplinary culture do distort incentives and evaluation in the humanities and do impair our standing in the modern university. But even in a newspaper opinion piece (or perhaps especially there) it is vital to present the humanities as they are. In many fields of the humanities the authoritative work is often done in articles; in many fields new evidence does come to light with regularity; and in many cases the big authoritative book builds on the foundations laid by a long series of articles which are all the better for having passed through the critical filter of peer-reviewed journals, which is often more rigorous than the appraisal and vetting to which book manuscripts are subjected. ---------------------------------------------------- Brad Inwood Department of Classics Toronto, Canada University of Toronto M5S 1A1 From: Paul Douglass Subject: Re: 10.036 more on tenure Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 09:03:36 -0700 (PDT) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 75 (75) Thanks for the forwarded message about Minnesota. Are you aware that the story is opn the cover of the current CHRONICLE OF HIGHER EDUCATION? PD. From: "Michael P. Orth (Michael Orth)" Subject: Re: 10.036 more on tenure Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 13:57:48 -0700 (PDT) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 76 (76) Oh Dear, oh dear. Jim Gardner protests that professors with a six hour teaching load are being accused by the Minn. press of "not pulling their weight." It is hard for those of us with 12 teaching loads, plus the same research expectation you guys have, to keep from agreeing with the bad guys (the ignorant public) in this. The Kraken===============end of file=================/;->?9 From: David Pinaula Subject: LEXA software opinions Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 02:14:39 -0400 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 77 (77) I am looking for opinions on the functionality and performance of the LEXA textual analysis software suite, particularly regarding handling multiple texts in producing lemmatized indexes. How does it compare to TACT's feature set? I'd like some informed commentary before I invest my kroners. David Pinaula English Dept. University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill pinaula@email.unc.edu From: Ian Lancashire Subject: Re: 10.037 TACT Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 00:38:37 -0400 (EDT) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 78 (78) As the one mainly responsible now for TACT and its manual, let me assure users that CHASS at Toronto continues to support TACT, even though CHASS no longer undertakes to send TACT diskettes and materials by post in reply to written inquiries. Several of the previous messages to Humanist have been unintentionally misleading. The only TACT manual authorized by the four authors of the software is being published by MLA early this fall. At about 370 pages, and with a donated CD-ROM having 250 Mb of software and electronic texts, this manual has been over three years in the making. The final corrections to the second and last page proofs were done early this month. This maturation time is not unusual for a peer-reviewed work of scholarship, especially one produced with the help of the MLA editorial department. Any delay in the publication schedule is my responsibility; MLA has kept up its end. I cannot praise highly enough the skill and dedication of the half dozen MLA staff members who have worked with me on the manual. They have helped transform an often wordy, obscure, ill-organized, and even wrong draft into a first-rate piece of reference prose. The book designer has done a wonderful job. I would also like to thank readers of Humanist for their interest in the TACT manual. Those wishing to buy the manual should order it from MLA in New York. The full reference is as follows: Using TACT with electronic texts: A Guide to Text-Analysis Computing Tools Version 2.1 for MS-DOS and PC DOS. Ian Lancashire in collaboration with John Bradley Willard McCarty Michael Stairs T. R. Wooldridge Centre for Computing in the Humanities University of Toronto The Modern Language Association of America New York 1996 (c) 1996 by The Modern Language Association of America ISBN 0-87352-569-8 (paper) 1. Text processing (Computer Science) 2. TACT. I. Title QA 76.9.T48L36 1996 Published by The Modern Language Association of America 10 Astor Place, New York, NY 10003-6981 By the way, all royalties to the five authors of the manual from its sales are being donated to help support future TACT work. Ian Lancashire Professor of English, New College University of Toronto E-mail: ian@chass.utoronto.ca URL: http://www.chass.utoronto.ca:8080/~ian/index.html From: "Joanne Woolway (Assoc. Editor, EMLS)" Subject: Re: EMLS Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 18:44:48 +0100 (BST) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 79 (79) EARLY MODERN LITERARY STUDIES UPDATE Dear Colleagues, You might already have seen the latest issue of EMLS (2.1) with its four articles on Shakespeare and numerous reviews. Since this issue we've added more materials to Interactive EMLS including: * An electronic post-print of John Spencer Hill's _John Milton: Poet, Priest, Prophet_ (London: Macmillan, 1979). * (With kind permission of Hardy Cook and various contributors) the SHAKSPER discussion archives, including many papers and reviews. * An electronic edition of Cawdrey's _Table Alphabeticall_ (1604) edited by Ray Siemens. * Spenser texts from Richard Bear (also at http://oregon.uoregon.edu/~rbear/index.html ). Coming shortly from iEMLS: * Conference details from "_The Faerie Queene_ in the World, 1596-1996" - a conference at the Yale Center for British Art, 26-28 September, 1996. * iEMLS is also happy to be supporting the _Milton Transcription Project_ - Watch the "current work" space! We hope that you will feel welcome to use iEMLS as a forum for work in progress and also to post papers, texts, conference details, and other resources that you think would be of use to the academic community or that you would like comment on before publishing elsewhere. If you'd like to know more about iEMLS or would like to send work for inclusion, please contact me at emls@sable.ox.ac.uk Thanks, Joanne Woolway Associate Editor, EMLS ------------------------------------------------------------------- ***ALSO FOR YOUR INFORMATION*** - EMLS's Oxford mirror site has a new URL: http://users.ox.ac.uk/~emls/emlshome.html Our UBC site is still at: http://unixg.ubc.ca:7001/0/e-sources/emls/emlshome.html From: Chris Smith at Indiana University Subject: New URL for Altramar medieval music ensemble Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 15:19:18 -0400 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 80 (80) Of potential interest to readers of the list: The Home Pages for Altramar medieval music ensemble have moved, to: http://www.indiana.edu/~altramar You can reach us via email at: altramar@indiana.edu Here you can find information about the ensemble, their recordings, performances, calendar, group and individual biographies, and tons of graphical and scholarly information, as well as: * Information about medieval history and music on the Internet; * Angela Mariani's nationally-syndicated early music radio program "Harmonia" and Chris Smith's world music program "One World;" * Links to B.O.M.B., Amandla, the Thesaurus Musicarum Latinarum, the Indiana University School of Music and Early Music Institute; and much more! If you maintain a Web site, and have already linked our pages, please do update to the above URL. If not, perhaps you would care to do so. Please feel free to visit us at the new URL. Either way, thank you! Altramar medieval music ensemble: Jann Cosart, Angela Mariani, David Stattelman, Chris Smith -- PO Box 2292, Bloomington, IN 47401-9998 (voice) 812/332-6402; (fax) 812/855-0729 http://www.indiana.edu/~altramar Recording for Dorian: "Nova Stella" (Italian Christmas music); "Francis and the Minstrels of God" (Italian laude spirituale); "Iberian Garden" (Jewish, Christian and Muslim Spain) From: Russon Wooldridge Subject: CH Working Papers: new postings Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 15:25:58 -0400 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 81 (81) CH Working Papers has recently published a number of postprints from the print series CCH Working Papers: [deleted quotation]vol. 4 "Early Dictionary Databases". Articles on TACT Design, applications of TACT to Shakespeare, Ovid and Simenon, on the dictionaries of Feraud (1787), Menage (1694), Le Ver (1440), Cawdrey (1604), Estienne and Nicot (1531-1628), and on 16th-c. French-English dictionaries. See http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/epc/chwp/ Russon Wooldridge, Willard McCarty Editors, CHWP ------------ Russon Wooldridge, Department of French, Trinity College, University of Toronto, Toronto M5S 1H8, Canada Tel: 1-416-978-2885 -- Fax: 1-416-978-4949 E-mail: wulfric@chass.utoronto.ca Internet: http://www.chass.utoronto.ca:8080/~wulfric/ From: Subject: Re: 10.042 posting a text? Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 82 (82) [deleted quotation] The text is currently formatted in [deleted quotation].... [deleted quotation] According to Laura Lemay, author of a 7-day HTML learning book, Wordperfect macros are available to automatically convert your document to HTML. WPTOHTML is listed as being available from URL: <gopher://black.ox.ac.uk/h0/ousu_dir/.html-stuff/wptohtml.html>. Also recommended is saving your document in Rich Text Format (RTF), and converting that to HTML. You didn't say you had DOS or Windows, but the RTFTOHTM filter is listed as being available from URL:<http://info.cern.ch/hypertext/WWW/Tools/RTFTOHTML.html>. Larry A. Taylor, . UCLA Computer Science Dept., Ph.D. candidate . Sometimes I do business as North Circle Software, 13104 Philadelphia St, suite 208, Whitter, CA 90601. Business phone, (310) 698-2739. Fax (310) 698-8164 if you absolutely have to. CIS 75176,1071. From: Subject: RE: 10.044 Humanist numbering scheme Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 83 (83) The leading zero idea is great except that if you happen to have more than 999 messages in this, the tenth year of the humanist, you fall back into the original problem. Why not yy.xxxx - more than 9999 messages seem improbable. Regards dennis -------------------------------------- dennis cintra leite dennis@eaesp.fgvsp.br sao paulo business school (eaesp/fgv) snail mail:av.9 de julho 2029 sao paulo, sp 01313-902 brazil py2-etn -------------------------------------- From: Subject: job posting Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 84 (84) Princeton University Coordinator, Humanities and Social Sciences Information Technology Princeton University seeks an individual to help coordinate and enhance the use of information technology in the humanities and social sciences and to assist especially in the development of instructional applications. An earned doctorate in a humanities or social science field and teaching experience at the college or university level are preferred, as is familiarity with instructional uses of technology and successful use of the medium for teaching. A fundamentally technical background is not necessary for this position, but a knowledge of software useful in developing course material is desirable. Princeton enjoys an excellent technical infrastructure for computing and a number of special resources, in the areas, for example, of electronic texts and computer graphics. The successful candidate will interact well with faculty members at various levels of skill and experience with the technologies, enhancing campus-wide awareness of electronic resources at the university, assisting faculty to utilize existing capabilities effectively in their teaching and research, and also working with faculty to plan future development. This position will act as liaison between the faculty and the University departments which provide support and service related to information technologies, as well as working with faculty individually and in small groups to develop understanding and use of the resources for instruction. Especially valuable will be the ability to "translate" between current faculty needs and technical potential. The coordinator will also assist with strategic planning for the future of instructional technologies in the humanities and the social sciences, drawing on his or her creativity and vision, as well as practical experience. Salary: commensurate with experience and qualifications. Starting date: August 1, 1996 or as soon thereafter as possible. To apply, please send a cover letter and current resume to: S. Georgia Nugent Associate Provost 5 Nassau Hall Princeton University Princeton, New Jersey 08544 Screening will begin immediately; to insure full consideration, materials should be received by July 1, 1996. Princeton is an equal opportunity employer. From: Subject: RE: 10.043 research and tenure Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 85 (85) Articles in the humanities are, to extend Brad Inwood's good point, not uncommonly *better* thought of than books. The dynamics of getting tenure, and the vanity of senior scholars and some presses, not uncommonly lead to bad books being made out of decent articles, in fact. What about this formulation: what would fit as an e-posting to the Classics List should never be blown up to article size; and what would fit as an article should never be blown up into a book? (I leave aside for now the question of the books that contain slightly recycled material from old articles, which are increasingly common.) Owen Cramer Classics/Comp. Lit. Colorado College OCRAMER@cc.colorado.edu From: Subject: London accomodations Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 86 (86) My wife and I plan to be in London late June-early July and have heard from a number of parties that the London House offers attractive accomodations for scholars. Does anyone on the 'Net have a telephone number for the London House that they might pass on to me?--privately, and not across the group, of course. Thanking you in advance, David Gants *** David L. Gants ** Electronic Text Center ** Alderman Library *** *** University of Virginia ** Charlottesville, Virginia ** 22903 *** *** dlg8x@virginia.edu *** etext@virginia.edu *** (804) 924-3230 *** *** http://www.lib.virginia.edu/etext/ETC.html *** From: Jean Ve'ronis Subject: Soft: MtScript (Multilingual editor) Date: Thu, 23 May 1996 11:45:13 +0000 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 87 (87) *** ANNOUNCING FREE SOFTWARE ALPHA RELEASE *** MtScript - The Multext multi-lingual text editor We are pleased to announce an alpha release of the multi-lingual text editor developed within the MULTEXT project, which provides facilities for creating and saving files in a wide variety of languages and corresponding character sets. MtScript provides the following main capabilities: o the use of several different writing systems (Latin, Arabic, Cyrillic, Greek, Hebrew, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, etc.) in the same document; o interspersing left-to-right and right-to-left writing systems (e.g. : Arabic - French - Hebrew - English); o explicit association of portions of a text with a particular language; o the definition of user-modifiable writing rules for each language; o use of a standard keyboard for any language and character set; o co-mingling of one-byte and multiple-byte character sets (ISO 8859 series, GB_2312_80, BIG_5, JISX0208, KSC5601). MtScript is freely available for non-commercial, non-military purposes (see our User agreement). A compiled alpha version (v1.1) for Sun Sparc stations under Solaris 1.x or 2.x can be downloaded from the URL <http://www.lpl.univ-aix.fr/projects/multext/MtScript/> Note that MtScript is an alpha version with bugs and limitations It is being distributed "as is" in order to solicit feedback. We invite the user community to send comments and advice, provide additonal fonts, help write language rules, etc. Jean Ve'ronis Multext project Coordinator_______________veronis@univ-aix.fr From: Subject: RE: 10.042 posting a text? Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 88 (88) [deleted quotation] A simple and effective solution would be to deposit the text with the Oxford Text Archive. The Archive has a high profile as a provider of on-line electronic texts to the academic community. The Archive also has a large collection of English Renaissance texts (including the 1633 edition of Donne's Poems) which would complement this prose satire. You can find out about the Archive's current policies and holdings from our web page at http://ota.ox.ac.uk/ota/ The Archive is not unacquainted with the problems of format conversion... Our policy is to make the text available in its original format where possible, but (for texts likely to be of permanent and general interest, such as this one) to convert the text to a TEI-conformant form which will guarantee its continued usability. While I have your virtual ear, this is probably a good opportunity to announce that (like HUMANIST) the Text Archive is currently celebrating a landmark birthday this year, its 20th! Long-time subscribers to HUMANIST will already be familiar with the working of the Archive, but it is obvious that a new generation of scholars is now emerging. For the new generation, digital resources are both basic requirement and the normal output of study. The next five years will be a testing ground to see how their expectations can be usefully met... In order to cope with these growing needs, an Arts and Humanities Data Service (AHDS) has been established in the UK to provide information, advice and resources to the electronic user community. In recognition of the central role the Oxford Text Archive has played in electronic scholarship, it has been appointed 'text provider' for the AHDS. We have already taken some steps towards re-shaping the Archive to meet the growing demands of users. A new Head of the Oxford Text Archive has been appointed. Michael Popham, previously Centre Manager of the CTI Centre for Textual Studies in Oxford, will take up his position at the beginning of August. We also hope to have new technical and administrative staff in position by the start of the new academic year. The exact structure of the 'new' Archive has yet to be finalised, as we will be working closely with the other Service Providers (who will cover areas such as moving/still images, sound, historical and archaeological data) but we do hope to offer a much improved service. Lou Burnard, custodian of the Text Archive for the past 20 years, will still continue to oversee its work as Manager of the Humanities Computing Unit at Oxford and his input will remain as valuable as ever. There will be a formal announcement from the Archive once the preliminaries of the AHDS structure has been worked out. Current information about the Archive can still be found at http://info.ox.ac.uk/~archive/, at our new Web address http://ota.ox.ac.uk/ota/ and from the recently-announced mirror site in Michigan ftp://ftp.hti.umich.edu/pub/ota/public Alan Morrison Information Officer Oxford Text Archive archive@ota.ox.ac.uk From: Subject: May 23 -- Today in the Historical Sciences Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 89 (89) MAY 23 -- TODAY IN THE HISTORICAL SCIENCES 1617: ELIAS ASHMOLE is born at Lichfield, England. The child of humble parents, Ashmole will study at the Lichfield Grammar School and then move to London, where he will receive training in the law. As a result of several fortunate political and social connections he will make while in London, Ashmole will receive a royal appointment in the College of Arms, eventually becoming a leading authority on the history of heraldry, and a significant collector of antiquities. His expanding interests will lead him to the study of botany, medicine, alchemy, and astrology, and he will be one of the founding members of the Royal Society in 1660. Ashmole will offer his extensive personal collections of antiquities and natural history specimens to the University of Oxford in 1675, and the Ashmolean Museum, the first public museum in England, will open at Oxford in 1683. 1707: CARL LINNAEUS is born at Sodra, Smaland, Sweden. The son of a country parson, Linnaeus will rise to be one of the most prominent figures in the history of natural history. Following study in medicine and botany at the Universities of Lund and Uppsala, Linnaeus will first spend time travelling in Lapland, and then will move to Holland where he will receive his medical degree. While in Leiden he will publish the first edition of his masterwork, _Systema Naturae_ (1735), which he will revise and expand many times over the course of his life. In 1741 Linnaeus will be appointed professor of medicine at Uppsala, and through his many students and his voluminous writings on systematics and natural history, his influence will spread throughout Europe and the world. Today in the Historical Sciences is a feature of Darwin-L, an international network discussion group on the history and theory of the historical sciences. Send the message INFO DARWIN-L to listserv@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu or connect to the Darwin-L Web Server (http://rjohara.uncg.edu) for more information. From: Subject: SGML BeLux '96 : call for contributions Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 90 (90) SGML BeLux '96 Third annual conference on the practical use of SGML October 31, 1996 - Brussels, Belgium CALL FOR CONTRIBUTIONS SGML BeLux vzw/asbl, the Belgian-Luxembourgian Chapter of the International SGML Users' Group, is organising its third annual conference on the practical use of SGML. As the very successful SGML BeLux '94 and '95 conferences have shown, these conferences serve as an active forum for the exchange of ideas and experiences with the use of SGML for electronic document engineering and information delivery. SGML BeLux is again seeking presenters to talk about all aspects of the practical use of SGML. If you or your company have used SGML in innovative ways in a document application, learned about some SGML problems the hard way, have a clear opinion on how SGML should be used or have valuable advice for beginners, we invite you to share your knowledge and experience with us. MAJOR TOPICS OF INTEREST Contributions to the conference can consist of a full-length paper or a collection of overhead slides dealing with a topic of interest to the conference participants. These topics include (but are not limited to): Case studies of (un)successful document applications and implementations Experiences with support tools: conversion programs, editors, browsers, on-line delivery Design of modular, reusable DTDs: development approaches, useful tips and techniques Use of databases: storage and retrieval of document components, object-oriented vs. relational Experiences with related electronic document engineering standards: HyTime, DSSSL, SPDL Internet document publishing: HTML vs. SGML, SGML viewers, generating documents on the fly INSTRUCTIONS TO PRESENTERS Presenters are invited to submit an abstract in English of approximately 250 words. The abstract should include the title of the proposed contribution with presenter names, affiliations and complete addresses. After acceptance of the abstract, the final version of the contribution must be submitted in camera-ready form according to detailed specifications available upon acceptance. Both the abstract and final version of the contribution should be submitted (in either hard copy or preferably electronic form) to: Paul Hermans, Conference chairman , BC, Interleuvenlaan 62, B-3001 Leuven, Belgium Tel: +32 16 40 66 81, Fax: +32 16 40 66 91, E-mail: Paul_Hermans@protext.be IMPORTANT DATES Deadline submission of abstract August 15, 1996 Notification of acceptance of abstract September 1, 1996 Deadline for camera-ready copy of contribution October 1, 1996 SGML BeLux '96 conference October 31, 1996 Paul Hermans Pro Text Interleuvenlaan 62 3001 Leuven Belgium +32 16 40 66 81 +32 16 40 66 91 (fax) From: Susan Hockey Subject: Text Analysis Software for the Humanities Date: Thu, 23 May 1996 09:27:35 -0400 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 91 (91) For some time, those of us active in humanities computing have felt the need for better and/or more widely accessible text analysis software tools for the humanities. There have been informal discussions about this at a number of meetings, but so far no substantial long-term plan has emerged to clarify exactly what those needs are and to identify what could to be done to ensure that humanities scholars have readily-available text analysis tools to serve their computing needs into the next century. In order to get something moving on this topic, the Center for Electronic Texts in the Humanities (CETH) convened a meeting on 17-19 May 1996 at which some developers of humanities text analysis software and a number of other interested humanities computing practitioners from several countries gathered to examine the matter in more detail. The invitation to the meeting outlined the following topics which might need to be addressed in any such effort: * determine the community of users (audience) for humanities text analysis software, in terms of who they are, what facilities they have access to, and what other factors will affect their computing needs in the future * clarify what functionality exists in current tools (TACT, OCP, TUSTEP, Monoconc, Opentext, SARA, LEXA etc) * specify what functionality future scholars might need * determine whether SGML should form the basic encoding scheme for any future text analysis software development efforts * review possible architectures for a set of text analysis tools * identify what other software used in humanities computing might need to interact with text analysis software The meeting came to a consensus that something does indeed need to be done and identified the following major topics on which work is needed: (1) Analysis of the needs of humanities scholars (2) More detailed study and analysis of existing software (3) Guidelines for the interoperability of a set of platform-independent tools that would be modular and extensible For this effort to succeed, it must involve the participation of the relevant user communities as much as possible. This announcement is the first step to inviting that participation. In the next few months a form must be found for organizing work in this area, and support found to co-ordinate it and keep it moving on an international basis. For the time being HUMANIST will be used to disseminate information and act as forum for discussion related to the effort. Susan Hockey Director Center for Electronic Texts in the Humanities ------------------------------------------------------------- Susan Hockey, Director, Center for Electronic Texts in the Humanities, 169 College Avenue, New Brunswick, NJ 08903 phone (908) 932-1384; fax (908) 932-1386 E-mail: hockey@rci.rutgers.edu From: Michael Sperberg-McQueen Subject: text analysis software planning meeting Date: Fri, 24 May 1996 09:13:29 -0400 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 92 (92) Readers of Humanist whose interest is piqued by Susan Hockey's announcement of the meeting recently held at Princeton to discuss text analysis software, and who wish to know more about the meeting, may be interested in a trip report describing it, which can be retrieved from http://www.uic.edu/~cmsmcq/trips/ceth9505.tei or http://www.uic.edu/~cmsmcq/trips/ceth9505.html The former, if you have Panorama; the latter, if you don't. -C. M. Sperberg-McQueen From: Subject: public opinion Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 93 (93) "Vox populi vox dei", "the voice of the populace is the voice of god", requires one of three things: a carefully chosen populace, one trained to agree with and support your point of view, or a less comfortable, more demanding god. In Canada and the United States at least, the populace as a whole has lost its superstitious reverence for the academy, and its emergent voice is asking uncomfortable questions about the nature and purpose of the privileged entity it supports. Numerous books have addressed the crisis in higher learning, but it is now spilling out into the public realm, in major academic gatherings. What the situation demands of us may be, as Margery Fee (Univ. of British Columbia) recently suggested at the Canadian Learned Societies Congress, "to learn the skill of producing effective oppositional sound bites". Dr. Fee's remarks are reported in today's Globe and Mail by John Allemang, in "Academe confronts the sound bite: Scholars need to get the public on the side of higher learning, but it's not easy for them to make contact" (section A, p. 7). Allemang notes the obvious: "for professors of the liberal arts, those subjects that profit the mind but don't necessarily turn a profit, it's a little more difficult to reach out to a wider public. First of all, a scholarly command of language and literature is not an easily identifiable commodity like knowledge of the tax laws. Second, these are people who have earned their stripes being discerning and hypercritical: they're not sure they want to make the compromises required to reach a broader public." This much we know, but as Allemang points out, there's also a profound difference in the kind of language and rhetoric required. "Academics, at least those in the humanities, prefer nuanced, involved, allusive speech", which to the unsympathetic often communicates only the speaker's detachment from the public sphere, perhaps even contempt for it. As Ursula Franklin, renouned scientist at Toronto, remarks in Allemang's article, "As students we were warned: Only the great dare touch the commonplace." The problem, then, does not exactly lie with an ignorant rabble; there is no solution in dismissing it by disparaging the vulgar. Rather, Franklin's remark suggests, we face the great challenge of learning to communicate with those who have no reason to listen. Arguably, if we cannot do this, we shouldn't be around -- and perhaps we won't all that much longer. Personally I reflect on two situations. From my childhood I recall my paternal aunt, who had quit school early to earn a living, had not the foggiest idea of what universities were about, yet believed with ferocious conviction that a university professorship was the highest of callings, worth whatever sacrifices might be required. From my daily life here in Toronto, I think about my local baker, who works 6 days a week from very early in the morning to the night, who looks on my life with utter incomprehension and clearly wonders why he should be supporting me and all the other privileged sorts at the university. At the recent annual meeting of the American Council of Learned Societies, 28 delegates contributed their thoughts in writing on the topic, "The Academy and the Public: What Should Scholars Expect from the Public(s)?" For example, Martin Ostwald (Swarthmore; American Philological Association), noted that the most difficult problem of persuasion is on behalf of "scholarly research and education in the arts and humanities, 'useless' pursuits, in that they yield no immediate visible results." Arguing from application (e.g. that foreign languages are valuable in business) is dangerously beside the point; the real matter, he noted, is to take the training of the mind seriously, to make the case for that, to keep "before the eyes of the public the necessity (not merely desirability as relaxation and diversion) of maintaining and fostering" these 'useless pursuits', so as to "give shape and meaning to life". At the ACLS meeting we were treated to a luncheon address by a U.S. senator from Utah, who clarified much of the conflict between scholar and public. He took the U.S. academy to task for deconstructing the American myth, e.g. by attacking George Washington for his sins against the land, for slaveholding, etc. Do this, he said, and you bite the hand that feeds you. Later on I wondered out loud what had happened to the Socratic ideal of education, what will happen if we spend our time seeking to please from a position of weakness. How do we fulfill the role of Socrates but avoid the hemlock? For good or ill -- I think for good -- computing in the humanities engages us with the world. We may be few in number, but perhaps we are part of the solution rather than the problem. Comments? WM Willard McCarty, Univ. of Toronto || Willard.McCarty@utoronto.ca http://www.epas.utoronto.ca:8080/~mccarty/wlm/ From: Subject: new project Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 94 (94) This is to announce a new project launched by the "Centro Linceo Interdisciplinare" of the "Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei" [via della Lungara, 10 - 00165 Roma] The project, named "Archivio Testuale Multimediale" (ARTEM), will pursue three main goals: 1) To build a repository of electronic texts in Italian language, selected on the basis of the best editorial reliability, and fully encoded according to the best standards available. The repository will be freely accessible in www network. 2) To link the repository to other similar ones, offering the same scientific reliability. 3) To build a catalogue of existing electronic texts in Italian language, providing a statement of their editorial reliability and encoding methodology, and stating if and how they are available. Special attention is devoted to the problems of encoding, following the SGML procedures, according to the standards proposed by TEI. The previous analysis of textual features, to obtain the full list of elements to encode, will be declared and discussed. Collaboration is evisaged with the Oxford Text Archive, Princeton's CETH, the Trsor de la Langue Franaise, the Institut fr deutsche Sprache of Mannheim, and all academic Institutions dealing with electronic texts and interested in this project. All those interested in the project, and especially those who can provide information on existing e-texts in Italian, may contact the following e-address: lincei@axcasp.caspur.it Tito Orlandi, Accademia dei Lincei, and Universit di Roma La Sapienza From: Subject: Stan Katz resigns Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 95 (95) Dear Colleagues: I pass the following press release along because it concerns a man who has been and, I hope, will continue to be important to humanities computing in the U.S. and elsewhere. Those of you who attended the Santa Barbara conference of the ACH/ALLC will recall Stan Katz's keynote address, in which he identified computing as a top priority of the academy for the next decade. It was with Stan's keen encouragement at the conference that I applied to the ACLS to designate Humanist as an adjunct publication. On behalf of Humanist, best wishes and deepest gratitude to Stan Katz for a job well done. Willard McCarty ----------------------------------------------------------------------- American Council of Learned Societies 228 East 45th Strict, New York, NY 10017-3398 PRESS RELEASE For Release: May 13, 1996 Contact: Douglas C. Bennett, Vice President 212-697-1505, ext. 124 Barbara Henning, Executive Assistant to the President 212-697-1505, ext. 123 STANLEY N. KATZ TO STEP DOWN AS PRESIDENT OF THE AMERICAN COUNCIL OF LEARNED SOCIETIES NEW YORK, New York. Stanley N. Katz has indicated his intention to step down as President of the American Council of Learned Societies sometime in the latter half of 1997, dependent upon when a successor is named. "It is with the deepest regret and no little sadness," said Francis Oakley, Chair of the ACLS Board and President Emeritus of Williams College, "that I accept Stan Katz's decision to step down from the presidency of ACLS next year after what will have been eleven years of notable accomplishment in that position. These years have been very good ones for ACLS, not least of all because of Stan's dedication, imagination, entrepreneurial energy, thoughtfulness and forthrightness as an advocate for the humanities. He himself has every reason to be proud of his achievement, and we, who have been the beneficiaries of his efforts, have every reason to be grateful to him." Katz became President of ACLS in July, 1986. He has been a vigorous advocate for humanistic scholarship throughout his tenure. During his decade of leadership ACLS significantly expanded its range of program activities on behalf of scholars and scholarly societies. Katz added a concern with education at all levels to the traditional ACLS concerns with scholarship in the humanities and social sciences. In 1991 the Council initiated a project working directly with K-12 teachers in the U.S. and Canada on curriculum and professional development. A succession of projects on comparative constitutionalism was a second major undertaking. Under his direction, ACLS also began work on a major new reference work, the American National Biography, which will be published in both paper and electronic forms beginning in 1999. As President, Katz also emphasized the role of ACLS as an international representative of U. S. scholarship. He promoted programs of international scholarly exchange and international studies research. He oversaw the affiliation of the Council for International Exchange of Scholars with ACLS and was deeply involved in defending and developing the Fulbright Program. Katz early identified the potential for digital, networked technology to restructure both scholarly communication and publishing. He drew ACLS into closer partnership with scholarly libraries and publishers to develop this new technology and explore its potential benefits. ACLS has recently joined with over two dozen other organizations to form the National Initiative for a Networked Cultural Heritage (NINCH). He refounded the ACLS publications program. The Council now publishes a newsletter, a series of Occasional Papers, and reports on scholarly issues. During his tenure he edited, with colleagues, two books which developed out of ACLS activities: Constitutionalism and Democracy, and A Life of Learning. Under Katz's leadership the number of learned societies affiliated with the Council increased from 45 to 58, and the value of the ACLS endowment increased from $15.8 million to $37.2 million. Katz will return to full-time teaching and research at the Woodrow Wilson School at Princeton University. During his presidency he has continued to teach one course each semester at Princeton. He also plans to continue his research on the role of philanthropy and non- governmental organizations in public policy. "My calling has always been that of a teacher. I have enjoyed the challenge of administering ACLS enormously, but I feel an obligation to return to my first love, the classroom," said Katz. Katz is a native of Chicago. He holds a B.A., M.A., and Ph.D. degrees from Harvard University. He taught at Harvard, the University of Wisconsin and the University of Chicago before joining the faculty of Princeton University as the Class of 1921 Bicentennial Professor of the History of American Law and Liberty, and, concurrently, Visiting Professor of Law at the University of Pennsylvania. The American Council of Learned Societies is the pre-eminent private humanities organization in the United States. A non-profit organization founded in 1919, it is a federation of 58 national learned societies in the humanities and social sciences. The purpose of the Council, as set forth in its constitution, is "the advancement of humanistic studies in all fields of learning in the humanities and social sciences and the maintenance and strengthening of relations among national societies devoted to such studies." A search committee for Katz' s successor is currently being formed and will begin its work in the Fall. Willard McCarty, Univ. of Toronto || Willard.McCarty@utoronto.ca http://www.epas.utoronto.ca:8080/~mccarty/wlm/ From: Subject: Francis Bacon and Shakespeare Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 96 (96) You may find the following site interesting: http://fly.hiwaay.net/~paul/outline.html From: Todd Blayone Subject: Re: 10.0057 the academy & the world Date: Sun, 26 May 1996 21:30:08 -0400 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 97 (97) [deleted quotation] I'm not sure that "computing in the humanities" automatically "engages us with the world." On my left sits a copy of _Literary & Linguistic Computing_. On my right sits a slick brochure advertising CD-ROMs (with titles like "World History" and "Great Authors"). The former exists as a direct result of "computing in the humanities." The latter appears to have a more humble origin. Nevertheless, the products advertised in the brochure will show up on home computers all over North America. BTW, how many Internet sites (produced by humanities scholars) target non-academic readers? How might "we" exploit the new medium to "engage the world"? --Todd Todd Blayone ***http://www.chorus.cycor.ca/blayone/todd.html Coordinator, Chorus ***http://www.chorus.cycor.ca/chorus.html Co-Editor, HCR ***http://www.chorus.cycor.ca/hcr/hcr.html Ph.D. Cand., McGill ***http://www.mcgill.ca From: carlyle@cats.ucsc.edu Subject: Comment on "public opinion" Date: Mon, 27 May 1996 20:41:15 -0400 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 98 (98) [The following was sent to me privately for posting on Humanist by someone not a member of the group but who is sent bits of our conversations from time to time by a friend who is. It takes a rather unexpected approach to the question I posed, suggesting that we hide from the public eye. Would this work? Would we want to live and teach in such a world? Does it make any sense to speak about the "liberal arts" surviving if they can only do so in obscurity and isolation from society? --WM] The only hope for the liberal arts lies in the public's utter ignorance of what they are. As long as the public has no concept of what humanities professors do, it can be cowed into believing that it might be important. The public is sure that science is important; the public knows that it is completely ignorant about science; therefore the public is willing to support science as such and leave it to the scientists to decide who gets the grants. The public mostly doesn't know that the humanities exist at all, and therefore it has heretofore supported humanistic studies only because supporting science entails supporting universities and (so far) universities insist on including the humanities. If humanities professors try to "reach out" to the public to explain to it what they do, they are doomed. The only strategy that holds any hope is to increase as far as possible the public's ignorance of the true content--even, if possible, the very existence--of the liberal arts. Scholars ought to take the position that has worked so well for the mathematicians: "What we do is so complex and sophisticated that you'd have to study for years before we could even begin to explain to you what our questions are." If the science departments could be sold on the idea, the best protection for the humanities would be the abolition of disciplinary and divisional categories for organizing the faculty. The object should be to return to the good old days when, as far as people who hadn't been to college were concerned, a professor was a professor, i.e., a mysterious, polymathic, absent-minded, myopic genius, the purpose of whose existence is to relieve the public of the necessity of exercising its intelligence on any topic. Mark Engel carlyle@cats.ucsc.edu From: Subject: Call for Papers Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 99 (99) CALL FOR PAPERS THE MIDWEST STUDY GROUP OF THE NORTH AMERICAN KANT SOCIETY FALL MEETING LOYOLA UNIVERSITY CHICAGO November 2-3, 1996 The Midwest Study Group of the North American Kant Society is a group, formed to advance the discussion of Kant and to promote interaction among Kant scholars. Papers on any topic in Kantian studies are welcome. The term "Kantian studies" is broadly conceived to include not only contemporary "Kantian" approaches to philosophical problems, but also the discussion of the German Idealists. Reading time should be around 30-45 minutes, leaving time for discussion. Works in progress are encouraged. Please submit a summary of the proposed paper or presentation (by U.S. post or e-mail) to: Manfred Kuehn, Department of Philosophy, Liberal Arts and Education Building, Purdue University, West Lafayette IN 47907 (E-Mail: kuehn@sage.cc.purdue.edu) SUBMISSION DEADLINE: September 7, 1996 The program committee of the meeting will be Pauline Kleingeld (Washington University), Manfred Kuehn (Purdue University) Fred Rauscher (Eastern Illinois University), and Hans Seigfried (Loyola University From: Subject: new members Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 100 (100) Dear Colleagues: In days of old I would periodically publish on Humanist the biographies of new members so as to introduce them to everyone else and promote collegial exchange. I have been meaning to take up the practice again, but surprisingly I have had much less time to spare than I did all those years ago. Thanks now to Gregory Murphy of CETH, I have an automatic means of collecting and formatting the information from the biographies, and so I propose once again to publish biographies. As an initial trial, I include below the two latest. Please let me know what you think of my proposal to make the publication of biographies a regular feature. Note that I edit them somewhat, removing the snail-mail address but retaining the electronic one. I would appreciate any advice. WM ----------------- 1. Elkins, James R. jelkins@prodigy.com Professor of Law University - faculty I received a JD from the University of Kentucky and studied at the Yale Law School. I am interested in lawyer ethics and presently teach a course called "Practical Moral Philosophy for Lawyers." I also teacher Lawyers and Literature and have written various papers drawing on the humanities. I edit an interdisciplinary journal called the Legal Studies Forum. 2. Suga, Hiroshi suga@harenet.or.jp a senior highschool teacher Secondary School I majored in French literature at Kansai Univ. in Japan. I have taught English at high schools for more than 20 years in Japan. I have formed my own corpus with 15 million words and made a reseach how often some English expressions taught in high schools in Japan are really used. I am looking forward to exchanging information in this forum. ------------------ From: Mark Steinacher Subject: Re: 10.0060 the academy and the world Date: Tue, 28 May 1996 01:15:29 -0400 (EDT) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 101 (101) Friends, Mark Engel's comments to the effect that the liberal arts community's best survival strategy is to make like my children's chameleons and blend into the background may well be the best advice we get. As an historian, I often have people wondering while I don't do something more "useful". One colleague even expressed surprise when I went into church history, rather than New Testament, because, and I quote: "You're SMART ENOUGH to do New Testament!" Engel's comments also bring to mind a cartoon my brother clipped for me years ago. In it were three men sitting at a bar. The little man in the middle was explaining to the two burly, heavily-tattoed, biker-gang-types parked either side of him that, "Well, actually, I get paid to stare off into space and think." They looked ready to beat him to a pulp. Is the average non-academic not feeling somewhat the same urges toward the "non-productive" academic community (read: the liberal arts)? Mark Steinacher steinach@chass.utoronto.ca From: Richard Giordano Subject: Re: 10.0060 the academy and the world Date: Tue, 28 May 96 10:42:43 BST X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 102 (102) Mark Engle's post implies that there are humanists, and there is 'the public.' Last time I looked, we were the public. As for the comment on mathematicians, an old roommate of mine from MIT, once explained to me the research he was doing on the passage of electrons across a cell membrane. It was one of the clearest explanations I ever heard, and I was a history major. I told him so, and his reply was that if you really *understand* your subject, you can explain it to anyone. I found in my own experience that my former roommate is right. /rich From: Mike Fraser Subject: CTI Publication: Computers & Teaching in the Humanities Date: Tue, 28 May 1996 17:18:52 +0100 (BST) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 103 (103) Computers & Teaching in the Humanities Edited by Michael Popham and Lorna Hughes Oxford: CTI Centre for Textual Studies, 1996. Pp. iv+88. ISBN 0-9523301-2-1 A selection of papers given at the CATH94 conference is now available as the second volume in the CTI Centre for Textual Studies' Occasional Series. The contents include: Perspectives on Computers in Education - The Promise, the Pain, the Prospect Design and Development of Courseware * Developing Educational Software: A Generic Approach * Developing Courseware in Archaeology * Courseware Development in Higher Education * Created Annotated Poetry Editions The Electronic Classroom: Courseware in Action * Multimedia in Language Learning, an Open or Closed Case? * Encountering Digital Media * Computer Modelling and Critical Thinking * From Modes to MIDI: Methodologies for Multimedia Music Courseware * Electronic Conferencing: Pedagogy Beyond the LAN * The Development and Implementation of Software for Vocabulary Acquisition * A Hypermedia Language Program for Telematic Dissemination Assessment and Implementation Issues * Ideals and Realities: Initiating and Evaluating the Use of Technology in the Curriculum * The Enriched Lecture: Courseware by Design * From IT Skill to Postmodernism: Implementing Degree-level Humanities Computing * Assessing CAMILLE * Exploiting Potentialities: the Hypermedia Dissertation at Southampton, 1992-94 * The Paperless Exam Electronic Resources for the Humanities * Information Skills - The Hypertext Approach * Internet Textual Resources at Oxford * SGML and the Internet Courseware in Action Case Study: The STELLA Project Computers & Teaching in the Humanities: GBP 10.00 per copy Postage & Packing per copy: UK GBP 1.00 Europe GBP 2.00 Rest of World GBP 3.00 All orders should be accompanied by a cheque made out to "Oxford University Computing Services". Please send name and address together with payment to Mari Gill, CTI Textual Studies, Oxford University Computing Services. 13 Banbury Road, Oxford OX2 6NN, UK From: "Peter Graham, RUL" Subject: Preserving Digital Information: Final Report Available Date: Tue, 28 May 96 14:13:05 EDT X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 104 (104) The final report of the Digital Archiving Task Force is now available at http://www.rlg.org/ArchTF/>. It was put up last week but announcements don't appear to have gone out. It is a very important report; following is some text describing it: "At the end of 1994 the Commission on Preservation and Access (CPA) and RLG created a Task Force on Archiving of Digital Information charged with investigating and recommending means to ensure "continued access indefinitely into the future of records stored in digital electronic form." The 21-member task force, co-chaired with distinction by Donald Waters, Associate University Librarian, Yale University, and John Garrett, Chief Executive Officer of CyberVillages Corporation, recently completed their final report. RLG and CPA are making this widely available online and in print." *********************************************************************** --pg Peter Graham psgraham@gandalf.rutgers.edu Rutgers University Libraries 169 College Ave., New Brunswick, NJ 08903 (908)445-5908; fax (908)445-5888 http://aultnis.rutgers.edu/pghome.html> From: Subject: Re: 10.0048 converting to HTML Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 105 (105) A footnote to Larry's remarks about rtf2html: I've written a front-end for rtf2html which allows you to process files using the file upload feature in netscape 2.0 or better. Visit http://eee.oac.uci.edu/toolbox/ This script will join rtf2html's separate endnote files to the bottom of your paper, producing a single document with footnotes as inline hyperlinks. In the same directory you'll also find file upload interfaces to 1) makemark, my program for converting Netscape bookmark files into publishable html documents, complete with hyperlinked Table of Contents. (The file upload version reflects a single document with an in-line TofC; the command line version, available at the same location, generates multiple files with 'next,' 'prev,' and 'up' links.) 2) splitlines, a program which wraps lines in a text file at the blank space closest to a user-specified number of columns. In short, this is word wrap for text files you want to upload. All of the above is 'helloware,' which is to say that it would be nice to hear from anyone who happens to use it. Eric D. Friedman friedman@uci.edu [deleted quotation] From: Subject: Re: 10.0062 new members Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 106 (106) I'd like to suggest gathering and publishing (first on Humanist and then at the Humanist Web site) the URLs of those Humanist subscribers who maintain Web pages--perhaps with some brief indication of what can be found there. Michael Hancher --------------- Michael Hancher Professor of English University of Minnesota mh@maroon.tc.umn.edu http://umn.edu/home/mh From: Ken Tompkins Subject: Comparative Politics Project Date: Tue, 28 May 1996 09:10:32 -0400 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 107 (107) I am posting this for a colleague not on this list; it would be helpful if members of this list would share it with their colleagues: ========== Instructor of undergraduate comparative politics course seeks to put his students online with their German, Japanese, and Russian peers. Any overseas colleagues that might be interested in collaborating in such a project can find more information at: http://loki.stockton.edu/~sensibaw/cpproj.htm William Sensiba SOBL Richard Stockton College of New Jersey Pomona, NJ 08240 ========= Ken Tompkins From: Charles Ess Subject: terms? Date: Tue, 28 May 96 09:09:47 CDT X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 108 (108) A colleague (from an institution which, for reasons that will become obvious, must remain unnamed) and I are searching for terms that describe the following maneuvers: 1) The Thrasymachus maneuver: in Plato's _Republic_, Book I, the archtype Sophist Thrasymachus is pictured as a "bathman," who, "after having poured a great shower of speech into our ears all at once," (344d, Bloom translation) seeks to physically remove himself from further argument with Socrates. A little more carefully: Thrasymachus interrupts the dialogue with an opening insult (Socrates needs a wet nurse to wipe his nose - i.e., he's speaking childish nonsense: 343a); bombards Socrates with a longish speech (343b-344c), and then turns to go - i.e., to close off any further debate by physically walking out. I have observed some of my more agonistic (and, indeed, sophistic) colleagues exhibit precisely this maneauver. Surely there's a term for this effort to overpower one's dialogical partner through the equivalent of mass bombardment followed by hasty retreat? Perhaps rhetoricians have a name for it? 2) the administrative maneuver: an administrator who seeks to eliminate a program begins, say, by first forbidding adjunct faculty from teaching core courses. Since, as we know, students tend to cluster around requirements, the student enrollments in the adjuncts' course go down. But since this means the enrollments in the entire program go down - the administrator can then publically point to these enrollment drops as perfectly rational reasons for eliminating the program. In sum: an initial, more or less secret and difficult to contest maneauver (adjunct faculty have no basis for fighting senior administrators) leads, apparently by design, to a publically demonstrable sign of weakness or inadequacy - i.e., a reason or ground difficult to contest in ostensibly open discussion. Machiavelli must have this down somewhere. Any candidates for a term? My thanks in advance, Charles Ess Drury College Springfield, MO 65802 USA From: Willard McCarty Subject: hiding won't work Date: Tue, 28 May 1996 21:23:29 -0400 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 109 (109) Perhaps no one will be surprised by my strenuous opposition to the idea that humanists will survive by staying out of the picture. I have no doubt that an increased public role will prove uncomfortable for many. My original title, "the academy and the world", was meant to echo the title of Satyajit Ray's film, "The Home and the World", and so to make that point faintly. Perhaps there remains too much American idealism in me, but I do not wish to be rid of this quality. It is one of the aspects of American culture that I find myself most glad to encounter when I return to my homeland. I don't mean primarily to be autobiographical, rather to reflect personally on the ideal that I first encountered as a young sprout in California. As I recall it is Jeffersonian, but perhaps someone closer to American studies than I am would care to correct me, or to fill in the picture. In any case, this is an international forum, or as international as we can make it speaking almost exclusively a single language mostly from a single continent. Presuming it makes sense to speak of "the humanities" in such a forum (give or take a discipline or two), can we really imagine that (a) the humanities can hide out and still get funded, and (b) that we would want to live in isolation? The many religious traditions of practice in isolation clearly show that great thought, if it can be called thought, prospers in silence, but the humanities I was trained to practice have engagement with the world at their core. For a long time we have not had to sing for our supper, because our worldly neighbours would leave bits of food on our doorstep, and lately we have somehow managed to live as well as the best of them. Now these neighbours have shed their superstitious ways and no longer think we bring good luck. If I hear my colleagues in the "pure" sciences clearly, they are suffering the same fate, or so they believe. Just whose banquet table are we going to hide beneath so as to catch the crumbs and scraps? More importantly, is this where we should be? It seems to me that if all we are worried about is our jobs then we don't deserve to have them, but that if we know enough to worry about our intellectual way of life, then we are essential and can prove it. Comments? WM Willard McCarty, Univ. of Toronto || Willard.McCarty@utoronto.ca http://www.epas.utoronto.ca:8080/~mccarty/wlm/ From: Haradda@aol.com Subject: Re: 10.0063 student contacts? terms? Date: Wed, 29 May 1996 11:06:51 -0400 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 110 (110) I always thought that this was called the Mushroom Treatment. First they plant you, then they cover your with manure, and after a while they throw you out....you get the idea. Maybe we should call this the Machivellian treatment. Because the intention is to put you on the sideline where you can't do anything but watch. Which is what happened to Machivelli and what usually happens to people of action. I am afraid that I have a very idealistic attitude toward humanistic or scientific knowledge. I belive that if a person really wants to understand something that they can if they put some time and energy into doing that. I continually have arguments with people that the general public can understand anything about politics, history, science. All you have to do is explain it correctly. I feel that if I read the liturature for six months (That's how long it takes me to read the last 10 years of the published liturature) I can understand what is happening in a field. Perhaps I should say that I think that I can understand what the specialists are saying and doing. I often find that specialists go out of their way to be esoteric and obscure in writing about what they are doing or thinking. It appears occasionally they they are only talking to about 15 people in the entire world. From: Malvernart@aol.com Subject: Re: 10.0060 the academy and the world Date: Wed, 29 May 1996 14:13:17 -0400 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 111 (111) I like your vision of the "good old days" and its description of the way the Professors were perceived by non graduate people. I do not know if you have ever been to England, but it certainly is still like this today! Best of luck in the pursuit of you art. Don Sergio. From: Fabrizio Pregadio Subject: Electronic format for non-roman script languages Date: Wed, 29 May 1996 22:04:20 +0100 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 112 (112) This message from the H-ASIA mailing list could be of interest to at least some subscribers of HUMANIST. Fabrizio Pregadio -- [deleted quotation] -- ============================================================ Calle Pasubio 10 | pregadio@unive.it 30132 Venezia | http://vega.unive.it/~pregadio/home.html ============================================================ From: John Saillant Subject: Editing position at Jefferson papers Date: Wed, 29 May 96 12:57:53 EDT X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 113 (113) [I send this on since you may want to post it on Humanist---J Saillant] Princeton University The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, Princeton University, seeks an Assistant or Associate Editor specializing in early American history to 1815. An advanced degree in American history required, Ph.D. and previous experience on a historical editing project preferred. Candidates must be computer literate and a reading knowledge of French is highly desirable. Rank and salary commensurate with qualifications. Send letter, resume, and three letters of recommendation by June 30, 1996, to John Catanzariti, Editor, The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, Princeton University Library, Princeton, New Jersey 08544. Princeton University is an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action employer. From: Ted Parkinson Subject: Re: 10.0062 new members Date: Wed, 29 May 1996 09:09:59 -0400 (EDT) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 114 (114) On Mon, 27 May 1996, Humanist wrote: [deleted quotation] I think the publication of (auto?)biographies straight to the list would take up too much bandwidth. Making them accessible in a database might be helpful. there is just toooo much information out there! ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Ted Parkinson Department of English McMaster University parkinsn@mcmail.cis.mcmaster.ca Hamilton, Ontario From: "Dr. Pauline Kra" Subject: Re: 10.0062 new members Date: Wed, 29 May 1996 15:24:23 -0400 (EDT) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 115 (115) Publishing the biographies is a good idea. The humanize the Humanist. Pauline From: Dennis Cintra Leite Subject: RE: 10.0066 publish URLs of members Date: Wed, 29 May 1996 17:09:04 -0300 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 116 (116) Good idea but how about including everyone's e-mail address? On Tuesday, 28 of May of 1996 22:17 Michael Hancher said: ---------- * From: mccarty[SMTP:mccarty@phoenix.Princeton.EDU] * Sent: Tuesday, 28 of May of 1996 22:17 * To: Humanist Discussion Group * * Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 10, No. 66. * Center for Electronic Texts in the Humanities (Princeton/Rutgers) * Information at http://www.princeton.edu/~mccarty/humanist/ * [1] From: Michael Hancher (60) * Subject: Re: 10.0062 new members * I'd like to suggest gathering and publishing (first on Humanist and then * at the Humanist Web site) the URLs of those Humanist subscribers who * maintain Web pages--perhaps with some brief indication of what can be * found there. * Michael Hancher * --------------- * Michael Hancher * Professor of English * University of Minnesota * mh@maroon.tc.umn.edu * http://umn.edu/home/mh -------------------------------------- dennis cintra leite dennis@eaesp.fgvsp.br sao paulo business school (eaesp/fgv) snail mail:av.9 de julho 2029 sao paulo, sp 01313-902 brazil py2-etn -------------------------------------- From: "Espen S. Ore" Subject: Re: 10.0054 text analysis software for the humanities Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 13:01:58 +0100 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 117 (117) At 17:31 24-05-96, Susan Hockey wrote: [deleted quotation] .... [deleted quotation] This initiative will be presented at the ALLC-ACH '96 conference in Bergen. A presentation is scheduled for Wednesday June 26 at 4PM. There are rooms available for BOF-sessions, and this might be a candidate. For further information about the ALLC-ACH '96 (and a registration form for those who have not yet registered), see: <http://www.hd.uib.no/allc-ach96.html> Espen Ore ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Espen Ore Tel: + 47 55 58 28 65 Norwegian Computing Centre for the Humanities Fax: + 47 55 58 94 70 Bergen, NORWAY Espen.Ore@hd.uib.no From: "H-CLC (BD)" Subject: COPAC: British Online Catalogue Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 08:14:37 -0400 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 118 (118) [deleted quotation] From: Subject: Studentship Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 119 (119) SCHOOL OF LANGUAGES AND EUROPEAN STUDIES UNIVERSITY OF WOLVERHAMPTON OPPORTUNITY FOR POSTGRADUATE STUDY IN COMPUTATIONAL LINGUISTICS AND LANGUAGE ENGINEERING The University of Wolverhampton invites applications for a PhD studentship from candidates interested in undertaking research in Computational Linguistics and Language Engineering. The project ------------- The successful applicant is expected to work on Language Engineering approaches to anaphor resolution which will complement the ongoing research on this topic at the School. Prerequisites --------------- Applicants should possess a good honours degree (or an equivalent degree if not obtained in a UK university) and will be expected to register for a higher degree (MPhil/PhD). Overseas candidates must have a good command of English. Candidates should have a background of Computational Linguistics. A good knowledge of one or more programming languages is essential. Bursary --------- The current value of the bursary is # 5, 500. In addition, up to six teaching hours a week would be possible (in consultation with the supervisor and depending on the appropriateness of the various modules on offer). Application and deadline ---------------------------- Deadline for application is 25 June 1996. The following documents are requested: (i) Application form (to be obtained from Ms. Leslie Barlow Email L.Barlow@wlv.ac.uk, tel. 44-1902-323317, fax 44-1902-323316; please cite reference RS138). (ii) Curriculum Vitae (iii) covering letter in which research interests are outlined, previous (e.g. undergraduate) and/or current projects are summarised and background in both Computational Linguistics and programming is described. Applications should be sent to: Ms. Leslie Barlow The Research Support Unit University of Wolverhampton Dudley Campus Castle View Dudley, DY1 3HR United Kingdom Enquiries ---------- Those wishing to discuss this opportunity for postgraduate study in Computational Linguistics can contact Dr. R. Mitkov Email r.mitkov@wlv.ac.uk, tel. (44-1902) 322471. The appointment of a research student is part of the expansion of the Division of Linguistics in the School of Languages and European Studies and is in line with the research policy of the School which has designated Computational Linguistics and Language Engineering as areas of research excellence. Topics of active research are anaphor resolution, automatic abstracting, neural networks, natural language interfaces. From: Marco Simionato Subject: quotations sought Date: Thu, 30 May 1996 21:36:22 +0200 (METDST) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 120 (120) I have found somewhere that both T.S.Eliot and W.C.Williams in their writings expressed reservations of the sonnet as a viable 20th-century poetic form, but no source was given for these statements. Any pointers? Please reply directly, thanks. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Marco Simionato Technical Translator, Software Localiser Dorsoduro 2408/b tel/fax +39 41 5225570 30123 Venezia, ITALY email: simionat@mbox.vol.it From: "Peter D. Junger" Subject: Humanist Archives and Discussion of Encrypting Texts Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 09:55:05 -0400 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 121 (121) This message relates to particular form to text encoding: text encrypting so that the unwanted cannot read one texts. I recall that some years ago--many years ago as one calculates things in cybertime--during the original avatar of Humanist we had a fairly lengthy discussion of the ways by which one could preserve the confidentiality of electronic messages, including the possibility of using compression programs and UU[en/de]CODing and obscure foreign languages. (As I recall I suggested using _Schweinfurterisch_.) I doubt that I preserved any of that discussion, though I have not checked my ``archives'' from that period, which archives, if they exist, are sitting on the ZIP disks that contain when is left of the information I collected on my old office machine running MSDOS, before I converted to a Linux system. But even if I have actual copies of those messages--which, as I just mentioned, is doubtful--I would like to be able to locate them in a public archive, if one exists, for use in a law suit I propose to bring to enjoin the enforcement of the licensing scheme under the International Traffic in Arms Regulations that makes it a felony to publish or otherwise disclose to ``foreign persons''--a term that I fear applies to many members of this list--any software, or description of such software, that is capable of preserving the confidentiality of information, without first obtaining a license from the censors in the Office of Defense Trade Controls in the United States Department of State. So my question is: Do the old Humanist archives still exist, and where are they located if they do? And I would also like to know if there are any other archives where those old discussions might be preserved. I should add that if any of you have found that you have been constrained in communicating information about cryptography--or if others have been constrained in communicating such information to you--because of the ITAR's licensing scheme, I would be very interested in hearing about it. The subject is one that should be of considerable interest to Humanists, since most schemes that can be used to sign or certify a text to attest to its accuracy can also be used for encryption, and are thus subject to the ITAR's licensing provisions. Which means that the software used for such signatures or certifications cannot be transmitted outside the United States, or disclosed to ``foreign persons'' even within the United States, without first getting a license. As I read the ITAR, even the disclosure by one foreign person to another outside of the United States of a description of cryptogaphic software would constitute a felony under the law of the United States: foreign persons cannot obtain licenses under the ITAR. (Of course the regulations are as unconstitutional as they are ridiculous; that is why I will almost certainly win my suit.) -- Peter D. Junger--Case Western Reserve University Law School--Cleveland, OH Internet: junger@pdj2-ra.f-remote.cwru.edu junger@samsara.law.cwru.edu From: Subject: URL correction Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 122 (122) It is with considerable embarrassment that I must correct an error in my earlier post on the web side for Applied Ethics. The correct URL: http://www.lcl.cmu.edu/CAAE/Home/Forum/ethics.html My apologies, and thanks to S. Quigley for letting me know. Color me red... Charles Ess From: Subject: NINCH Newsletter on Web Site Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 123 (123) NINCH ANNOUNCEMENT The NINCH Newsletter # 3 (October 23, 1996) can now be found on the NINCH Web site (http://www-ninch.cni.org/News/Newsletter3.html). From: Wendell Piez Subject: Re: 10.0360 books real and virtual Date: Thu, 24 Oct 1996 18:00:35 -0400 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 124 (124) Marta Steele writes: [deleted quotation] Yes, it does -- one major difference being that when you post _these_ marginal scrawls, others get to read them, including possibly the author of your pre-text. It's as if books were always the playground of the mind, but very much a sandbox for one until you were admitted into the company of the Big Kids and were allowed to publish. With the networked computer, anyone can join -- at least one game or another. It's true that you can write these notes on your PC and never post them, but unless the exercise is deliberately introspective (i.e. unless you drop the pretence that your words will ever reach out), such a practice gets to seem kind of idiotic (at least in a literal sense of a closed private world). (I say this not to censure, being prone to it myself.) Fundamentally, books meant that you could have your reactions, and they were privately yours. This can be great for those who work to sort things through on a personal level; but this kind of activity is also one which serves to let us indulge our prejudices without facing consequences. In e-text, we have a greater power to respond, i.e. to take responsibility -- and when we do, others tend to hold us to it. It's a moral exercise of a very different kind. -- Wendell Piez From: Francois Lachance Subject: book & crooks Date: Thu, 24 Oct 1996 21:22:29 -0400 (EDT) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 125 (125) Willard, The following remarks will explain my question to you: how much influence does an editor/instigator have over the shaping of a debate? Some exerpts from my remarks prompted by a question from Robert Fowler There is a leap in here between periodization and comparison. Indeed an acquaintance with parallel time lines, their construction and reading, is at play in these remarks.... [deleted quotation] Answer to my own question: Only as much as you let them have. You might to cast out the question as to how the myopism of the techno-haves is aided and abetted by "codex fetischism" and its cousin "electronic reification". Francois From: Hope Greenberg Subject: Re: 10.0360 books real and virtual Date: Fri, 25 Oct 1996 10:14:55 +0000 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 126 (126) Marta Steele says: [deleted quotation] Having been through the book versus computer discussion many times (Book: "I can take it to the beach, I can cuddle with it, I can read it more easily, it feels nice, it lasts, I don't have to plug it in or run it on a battery") and (PC: "I can create smart text, I can search it, I can manipulate text more easily, I can share text immediately, I can communicate quickly, I can include non-text more easily"), I wonder if we are worrying about the design of the front door when the whole house stands before us. We've grown up with futuristic visions being trotted out daily, always prefaced by "someday we will. . ." but now they are actually being created. Take a look at a group of students at MIT who have been wearing computers for several years (Steve Mann at http://www.wearcam.org/, the group at http://lcs.www.media.mit.edu/projects/wearable/) or for a lighter, more general idea see Negroponte's brief article on wearable computing at http://nicholas.www.media.mit.edu/people/nicholas/WIRED3-12.html. What happens to our consciousness and thinking, indeed, when putting on our shoes in the morning boots up our computer and powers it throughout the day, when our "screen" is hoovering in front of our glasses, when "networking" and passing data is done with a literal handshake, when the 'net is always there when you want it, when you can type your manuscript with a hand held device the size of a mouse and all these things interact with the computers built into the world around you? There are active prototypes for all these possibilities in use right now--not futuristic vaporware at all. So, when my 12 year old daughter goes off to college in a world where computing is more intimately bound up in what we do, when it is an ubiquitous part of our immediate environment and not an unwieldy box over there that is hard to read from, what will humanities computing be? Hmmm....I think I'll go invent the "new book," a fold out padded bit of cardboard in a variety of colors that I can focus my computer display glasses on so I have a nice calming surface to read from and that is emminently "cuddle-able." - Hope ------------ Hope Greenberg University of Vermont http://www.uvm.edu/~hag From: TRIP10@aol.com Subject: DIGITAL CONTENT PROTECTION (long promo) Date: Wed, 23 Oct 1996 19:04:58 -0400 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 127 (127) ******** NFAIS Special Session *********** Cosponsored with ASIS and the Washington, D.C. Chapter of SLA DIGITAL CONTENT PROTECTION: Protecting and Distributing Copyrighted Material-- Where Are We Now? Date/Time: Thursday, October 31, 1996, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Location: AARP Headquarters, 611 E. Street, NW., Washington, D.C. 20049 Price: NFAIS, SLA and ASIS Members $100 each. Lunch Included. Non-Members $125 each. Lunch Included. **** Special Session Moderator: BONNIE LAWLOR (UMI) The White Paper Legislation: Where Is It Going? Presented by JOE BREMNER, Attorney at Law and Author of Guide to Database Distribution. Whatever happened to the legislation that resulted from the President's Information Infrastructure Task Force on Intellectual Property in Digital Environments? Measures designed to extend copyright protection to electronic content met with resistance. But why? And what does it mean for our future as electronic information providers? *** Database Protection: New Rules in Europe (And How They Came To Be) Presented by BARRY MAHON, Executive Director, EUSIDIC. Over a five-year period, EUSIDIC was actively involved in efforts by the European Community to hammer out guidelines for new means of protecting electronic content--beyond copyright and licensing. Hear how the resulting "Database Directive" came to be. What issues were resolved? Which are left outstanding? *** The European Database Directive: What Is The Impact Here? Presented by STEVE METALITZ, Attorney at Law. Members of the European Union will enact new laws over the next several years to protect producers of factual compilations. But many publishers in the U.S. are exempt from protection under these rules, which apply only to publishers who reside in Europe. But efforts are afoot to mirror the European Directive here. Hear the details! **** Building on the White Paper and the EC Directive: The Database Investment and Intellectual Property Act of 1996 Presented by DAN DUNCAN, Information Industry Association. IIA has been working with Congress to draft and introduce legislation that would better protect electronic content. Dan will review these legislative efforts and give a prognosis on the likelihood that these bills will be passed soon. *** Maintaining the Balance--Updating the Copyright Act Presented by PRUE ADLER, Association of Research Libraries (ARL). Recent efforts to update the Copyright Act to the digital environment were not successful during this recent congressional session. Maintaining the balance between the interests of owners and users of copyrighted resources emerged as a key theme in the congressional discussions. Prue will share the library community's views on the recent legislative debates. *** Database Protection--The Possible Downside Presented by PETER JACCZI, Professor of Law, The American University. Critics of the European Database Directive and related legislation in the U.S., fear that proposed changes could be interpreted too broadly and maybe even upset the intellectual-property-protection apple cart. Peter will discuss his concerns about the proposed legislation as written. *** Potential New Legislation and Unresolved Issues-- What Could Happen Next? Presented by JOE BREMNER. What else is happening with copyright--both from a legislative and a case-law point of view? Last year, we saw shrinkwrap licenses come into question, before the courts reversed their decision. In recent years, courts have ruled against as well as in favor of "course-pack" photocopying. Where's it all headed? What could happen next? ________________________________________________ *** To register for this event: Contact. . . The National Federation of Abstracting & Information Services (NFAIS) 1518 Walnut St., Suite 307 Philadelphia, PA 19102 215 893-1561 Fax: 215 893-1564 e-mail: chudie@aol.com or nfais@hslc.org From: "William R. Bowen" Subject: ITER Date: Fri, 25 Oct 1996 12:05:33 -0400 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 128 (128) A pre-release version of ITER, the online bibliography for the period 1300 to 1700, is now available to the public through the homepage www.library.utoronto.ca/www/iter. At present, the database has records for 50,000 journal articles. Please visit the site and let us know what you think. Bill Bowen Director, Iter ********************************************************************* William R. Bowen Scarborough College and Faculty of Music University of Toronto University of Toronto: bowen@chass.utoronto.ca Scarborough College: bowen@scar.utoronto.ca FICINO: editor@chass.utoronto.ca From: "William R. Bowen" Subject: RSA homepage Date: Fri, 25 Oct 1996 12:05:33 -0400 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 129 (129) Members of FICINO may be interested in visiting the homepage for the Renaissance Society of America at citd.scar.utoronto.ca/rsa/index.html. This release of web pages includes information about the society, its activities, publications, and membership. More will be added in the near future. ********************************************************************* William R. Bowen Scarborough College and Faculty of Music University of Toronto University of Toronto: bowen@chass.utoronto.ca Scarborough College: bowen@scar.utoronto.ca FICINO: editor@chass.utoronto.ca ********************************************************************* From: Subject: Re: 'Real' books Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 130 (130) Sorry for the delay in replying to the various postings: it's been one of those weeks. There are one or two points I'd like to clarify, and a distinction or two to make. Also, sorry for the length. To steal from Pascal, if I had more time, I'd make this shorter! 1. Technology/technology, Book/book It's probably important to distinguish two senses here. On the one hand there's big-t technology versus little-t technology, and on the other big-b book and little-b book. The first refers to the conceptual categorization of a set of tools, the second to a particular manifestation of these tools. So we can talk about the Technology of the Book, meaning sequentially bound sheets, and the technology of a book, meaning the particular stack of bound sheets in front of me just now.=20 Similarly, we can refer to the Technology of the Computer (meaning some input mechanism, some processing and some output) as well as to the particular technology of a particular computer (for example, a 486 100 Mhz machine running Windows95, with a .28 14" screen, etc.). So when Willard writes: Where I think the case for replacement is dubious is when the computer is being used to model an activity for which it is inherently unsuited, grossly overpowered, or both. If one is READING a text rather than consulting it, why use a computer, which at least now is too bulky to be very convenient, produces a low-resolution image, and costs money to run? Seems silly to me. he's talking sometimes about Technology and sometimes about technology. The same tension occurs in Marta Steele's reply: You can't pull an online publication off your shelf to show a friend the book you've just published, nor will it sport a custom-designed jacket with an artist's rendition of your theme. It will not last a hundred years or more if well tended to; maximum life of disks is at this point 25 years if you're lucky, but we're always warned to back things up, etc., so I'd be wary of that figure. When you publish something and have slaved years over it, do you want to call it up on a screen as flickering waves or admire something that is visually appealing and tangible? Yet it's crucial to keep the two senses distinct. Take the case of Book/book. The Book has an advantage over the Scroll by offering non- sequential access (compare Tape and CD). However, the Book has problems with reordering or textual manipulation. To test this, take Queneau's "Cent mille milliards de po=E8mes" out of your library. This is a book with slices of paper on each page, each of which contains a line of a poem. Different slices can be folded up giving the indicated number of total poems. This book pushes the limits of the Book; as a book, it's also likely to be torn and taped. As a Book, it manages to give some limited freedom, but doesn't allow, for example, reordering lines within the same poem. On the other hand, another Technology like hypertext does this easily, even if the technology (a six-pound laptop, for example) still has shortcomings. In short, we may have qualms about a technology, but we shouldn't let this distract us from considering the Technology it exemplifies and asking ourselves what its limits might be. 2. Reading Drawing on old work in lexicography, let's distinguish three perspectives on texts: consultative (looking up), discursive (reading sequences of text) and esthetic (textual pleasure). One doesn't exclude the others, but together, they allow us to characterize our ways of dealing with varieties of texts. Consider the following table: consult. discurs. esthet. library catalogue + - - dictionary + - - encyclopedia + + - journal article + + - scholarly book + + - novel - + + On the surface, this looks nicely clean. We consult library catalogues, but not novels. We treat novels as esthetic objects, but don't do the same for dictionaries. But wait: some people would claim that Diderot's Encyclop=E9die is an esthetic object. A number of authors of scholarly books would consider that their work has important esthetic facets. How about the numerous queries on HUMANIST itself asking which x said y, or where x said y? Is this not consulting? Or how about a collection of poetry? Do we ever consult it? So there appears to be some fuzziness here. Now, we all know that there is a technologizing wave moving along which has swallowed up library catalogues, most of dictionaries, most of encyclopedias, is working on journals, and starting on textbooks. Should we assume that this wave will be halted by the novel, or by books of poetry because they are FUNDAMENTALLY different from other sorts of text? My own expectation is that with the exception of books as art- form, as described by Matthew Kirschenbaum, novels, textbooks and scholarly works on paper will be essentially gone twenty years from now. (Ask me again in 2016!) There are already hints around. I recently stopped at a business supply store with a sideline in computing software and hardware. They were selling a CD-ROM containing 350 stories (the usual classics) for $24.95. I suspect that this will increase. 3. Attitudes Willard worries that by concentrating on the electronic book, we cater to only a fraction of the population. As he puts it: "Developed-nation myopia is a seriously debilitating condition!" I would reply that we can't change the world, but we can push or pull in one direction or another. I'm also reminded of the discussion which took place in Canada a number of years ago when the metric system was first proposed. There were three groups at least to be found: a) proponents of the new system who claimed that whatever its current shortcomings, it was essentially superior to the imperial system; b) opponents who resisted any change to a system which had worked reasonably well for a long time; c) the indifferent. Now that the metric system has been adopted, we find layers of generations. To grossly simplify, there are: - the young, who know only metric - the middle-aged, who know both metric and imperial - the old, who know only imperial I am struck by the analogy with the introduction of electronic technology in the humanities. What concerns me is that in the replies to date, I don't see much evidence of attitude a) when it comes to electronic books. Are we all too old (or at least middle-aged)? Or should we see it as our duty as computing humanists to push the limits of information Technology, which means trying it out every chance we get? After all, (1) it's fun, and (2) if we don't, who will? From: Subject: CFP: Culture and the Literary Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 131 (131) }} Call for Papers from Graduate Students in all Disciplines }} }} Culture and the Literary }} }} Annual Graduate English Conference at Radford University }} }} Saturday, March 22, 1997 }} }} }} }} What is the nature of the constant interactions between culture and the }} literary? How can academic disciplines engage the literary and still be }} mindful of culture? Through what processes have connections been made in }} the past between culture and the literary? How might we forge new }} correspondences between textual criticism and theories of culture? }} }} Papers are invited from all literary genres and periods. We especially }} invite submissions of essays which engage in current theories of gender, }} nationhood, and popular and material culture. Cross-disciplinary papers }} may involve the fields of Philosophy, Communications, History, Sociology, }} Biology, and Anthropology; other areas and perspectives are welcomed. }} Panels with representatives from diverse disciplines are strongly }} encouraged to submit. }} }} Inexpensive accomodations available for out-of-town graduate students. }} Registration fee of $20 includes a brown-bag lunch. }} }} Panel proposals and individual abstracts are due by November 22, 1996 }} }} Submissions and queries to: }} }} Rita Kranidis }} 540.831.5152. or 5614 }} English Department, Box 6935 }} Radford University }} Radford, VA 24142-6935 }} mkranidi@runet.edu }} }} Questions or concerns regarding general information about the conference: }} Libby Bradford }} 540.731.1944 }} English Department, Box 6935 }} Radford University }} Radford, VA 24142-6935 }} lbradfor@runet.edu } From: Subject: Request for information on extraction of content from Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 132 (132) email Hello, I am researching the automatic extraction of pragmatic and linguistic content of emails. I would appreciate it if anybody knows of any related work in this area. Thanks, Yours sincerely Hamid Khosravi From: Ron Tetreault Subject: Books real and virtual Date: Mon, 28 Oct 1996 08:54:19 -0500 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 133 (133) I admire Greg Lessard's chutzpah in speaking so forthrightly in favour of the computerized book, though I suspect he was pulling our virtual leg. Willard, however, has raised some serious issues about the distinction between real and virtual texts. Though a dedicated e-book maker, I'd give odds on the survival of print media. Books are portable, comparatively cheap, and usable by people all over the world. In these discussions, we always need to remind ourselves that we're not obliged to place books and e-texts in competition. Instead I prefer to emphasize the differing strengths of each. Yes, as Pamela Cohen points out, books and print are the medium of permanent record, and are likely to remain so. But it is precisely the infinite revisibility of a text in the electronic medium that gives it a capacity for growth and development that the book does not offer. Digital media only justify themselves when they do things that cannot be done any other way, so that if I make an e-text it is not to replace the book but to give the text a dimension it does not have in print. The stasis of print is valuable for some purposes, but the dynamism of electronic texts produces an almost living, organic effect whose consequences we are only beginning to realize. Even so basic a function as searching gives the e-text an aura of animation, and WWW hypertext links offer a glimpse of Ted Nelson's "docuverse" as a living organism, evolving and interdependent. Let me be so bold as to propose something I'll call the Tetreault test: If you can print out an e-text without losing something vital, it wasn't worth electrifying in the first place. --Ron ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ + Ronald Tetreault Tel: (902) 494-3494 + + Department of English Fax: (902) 494-2176 + + Dalhousie University Home Fax: (902) 453-4786 + + Halifax, Nova Scotia e-mail: tetro@is.dal.ca + + B3H 3J5 CANADA or Ronald.Tetreault@Dal.Ca + + http://is.dal.ca/~tetro/home/welcome.html + + learning by the (cyber)sea + From: "Amsler, Robert" Subject: RE: 10.0360 books real and virtual Date: Fri, 25 Oct 1996 16:05:47 -0400 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 134 (134) I wanted to mention something that I heard from a colleague. Their graduate students are printing them out of house and home, downloading so much information over the web and printing it out on their grants and contracts that it is costing their projects too much for the paper, toner, etc. I believe this is the tip of a new iceberg. The publishing world has at its disposal a new tool that permits them to pass the cost of printing on to the consumer. I believe the whole equation may change. Journals, as middlemen, never did pay their authors; in fact, I remember cases where they charged my company for the pages of my article that they were publishing. So, authors are distributing things without journals. How this will affect libraries is an interesting issue. On the one hand, libraries currently have the paper budget to buy books and journals for the whole university, so to speak. Departments may decide this isn't working out too well as they now have more things to acquire directly and they have to pay to print them; so they may want some of that budget back--then too, departments are notoriously bad at keeping their literature organized, so they may want to pass the printed Web pages off to the library for cataloguing, storage and access. Some departments might decide that the library should be the ones to download the materials directly--i.e., by recommending web sites the way they now recommend journals. Then the library would be the one to monitor the sites for new publications. Certainly the ephemeral nature of Web files, posted by research groups, directly by the authors, by organizations of all types, screams out for someone to capture and preserve these things before they are deleted by their owners and become irretrievable suddenly. The issue of paper vs. electronic storage is also there. So far, NOBODY has told me they like to read large documents on the Web. This tends to say that while students may be forced to read things online, they will want the option to print them out, and may even be willing to pay for that (if they can afford it). The question of what happens when professors assign students to do Web-based research for a project seem to come up. If a whole class full of students needed access at one time; or toward the end of semester entire sets of classes were trying to complete reports to turn in by accessing the Web for their research--the demands on numbers of terminals available at one time would be quite high. I.e. libraries started with the terminals being the INDEX, used for a time to get references which were then tracked down in the real library; then terminals became an augmentation to the library for newspaper and other short articles; but now the prospect looms of the Web as the SECOND LIBRARY--one in which students and faculty will want to download (i.e. borrow) much larger articles and documents--or, less likely, stay in front of the terminal for the whole time while they read them; i.e. terminals will have to be as plentiful as chairs in the library or as visitors to the library building. Libraries can blunt the cost of having ample printers, administering the cost of printing, etc. by offering downloading and pushing the cost of printing off to the student's home computer; OR go into the printing role more actively by providing bigger and less expensive per page printing equipment to try and keep printing costs down (though equipment and operational costs would go up). Universities faced with the Web as an essential part of education may have to resort to university web access facilities--far more extensive than existing computer labs, probably featuring less expensive Web computer terminals, intended largely just to provide access to Web pages, printing, etc. and no "computing" as we now use the term to refer to word processing, spreadsheets, database access, etc. These times they are a changing... Robert A. Amsler Computational Linguist From: Subject: computers and children's play Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 135 (135) [deleted quotation]two stories by Clare Garner that tell a story about how we perceive the consequences of technology. In "You can't play tag on a computer. Or hopskotch. Or skipping. So kids are getting lessons in forgotten playground games", the author describes a project at the Saracen Primary School, Hamilton Hill, Glasgow. The head teacher, Evelyn Gibson, explains that "With videos, computers, CDs, and other advances, children just have to plonk themselves down and be entertained.... At the moment children become bored in the playground, which leads to mischief or rough acts, and can end in tears." So she cut the lunch-break to 20 minutes, but is now attempting to resurrect traditional games, in essence to attempt to teach children how to play, to draw them away from imitating the characters they encounter on their computers at home. As the article notes, many child-psychologists object to the notion that play can be taught. Among them is Iona Opie, whom many Humanists will know from the many books about and collections of children's literature she wrote with her husband Peter. "Nobody knows more about children's games than Iona Opie. And nobody is more appalled by the Saracen project," writes Garner in "'I never played kiss-chase and I had quite a normal sex life'". "'Children have got the instinct for making fun,' she says. 'They always do it [play], I'm absolutely certain, unless someone has gone round injecting them with some deadly dope.'" So the problem lies, Mrs. Opie says, in our failure to recognise that all around us children are at play. She does not slam computers, as the Saracen teachers do, but sees them as "the Nineties equivalent of marbles and fivestones". 'Do not interfere!' is her message, even in the face of boredom. "You've got to experience boredom and getting out of boredom on your own initiative. You've got to get into mischief and out of mischief. This goes on all your life." Indeed.... If only "mischief" were as serious as it gets. If only computers were entirely to blame. Two reflections: how difficult it is to face problems squarely; what software truly adequate to a child's inventive genius for play might look like. The first is, I'd guess, an unsolvable problem coterminous with life, but the second is a fascinating problem for research. Does anyone know what is happening in that area, and how designers of scholarly software might benefit from its findings? WM ------------------------------------------------ Dr. Willard McCarty, Senior Lecturer King's College London / Strand / London WC2R 2LS +44 0171 873-2784 / Willard.McCarty@kcl.ac.uk http://www.kcl.ac.uk/kis/schools/hums/ruhc/wlm/ From: DARWIN@iris.uncg.edu (12) Subject: Smithsonian Institution Fellowships (fwd) Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 136 (136) *************************************************** Please forward to appropriate lists and individuals. Apologies for any cross-posting. *************************************************** The Smithsonian Institution encourages access to its collections, staff specialties, and reference resources by visiting scholars, scientists, and students. The Institution offers in-residence appointments for research and study using its facilities, and the advice and guidance of its staff members. SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION FELLOWSHIP PROGRAM The Smithsonian Institution offers fellowships for research and study in fields which are actively pursued by the museums and research organizations of the Institution. At present these fields are: Animal behavior, ecology, and environmental science, including an emphasis on the tropics Anthropology, including archaeology, Astrophysics and astronomy Earth sciences and paleobiology Evolutionary and systematic biology History of science and technology History of art, especially American, contemporary, African, and Asian art, twentieth-century American crafts, and decorative arts Social and cultural history of the United States Folklife POSTDOCTORAL FELLOWSHIPS are offered to scholars who have held the degree or equivalent for less than seven years. SENIOR FELLOWSHIPS are offered to scholars who have held the degree or equivalent for seven years or more. The term is 3 to 12 months. Both fellowships offer a stipend of $25,000 per year plus allowances. PREDOCTORAL FELLOWSHIPS are offered to doctoral candidates who have completed preliminary course work and examinations. Candidates must have the approval of their universities to conduct doctoral research at the Smithsonian Institution. The term is 3 to 12 months. The stipend is $14,000 per year plus allowances. GRADUATE STUDENT FELLOWSHIPS are offered to students formally enrolled in a graduate program of study, who have completed at least one semester, and not yet have been advanced to candidacy if in a Ph.D. Program. The term is 10 weeks; the stipend is $3,000. These fellowships support research in residence at all Smithsonian facilities except the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory (see below). Postmark deadline for submission - January 15, 1997 Stipends are prorated for periods of less than twelve months. FELLOWSHIPS AT THE SMITHSONIAN ASTROPHYSICAL OBSERVATORY Applicants interested in conducting research at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory should write to the Office of the Director, Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, 60 Garden Street, Cambridge, MA 02138 for program information, application materials, and deadlines. Fellowship Applications, supporting materials, and information on other Smithsonian Institution fellowhsip and internship programs can be retrieved at the following address (but they must be submitted by postal mail): http://www.si.edu/research+study or by contacting: Office of Fellowships and Grants Smithsonian Institution 955 L'Enfant Plaza, Suite 7000 Washington, D.C. 20560 (202) 287-3271 or E-mail: siofg@sivm.si.edu (Please include mailing address for requested materials) *************************************************************** Pamela E. Hudson, Academic Programs Specialist Office of Fellowships and Grants Smithsonian Institution oasbb001@sivm.si.edu phone: (202) 287-3271 From: Attachment Research Center Subject: Re: 10.0366 computers and play Date: Mon, 28 Oct 1996 21:28:39 -0300 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 137 (137) Children who do not engage in active play have a serious problem with socialization. Anybody who has read Bowlby knows that children who fail to engage in social interactions are detached children. And they are detached because their parents, particularly their mothers, are absent. Physically and mentally absent. Offspring of detached parents fail to trust their caregivers and so cannot construct what Bowlby calls a "secure base", whereby the infant leaves his mother for longer and longer periods, returning from time to time, to check out whether their mother is still responding (to check out whether they can trust their mother is a reliable base). Excursions into the environment and socialization with other people, other children included, is antithetical to attachment behaviour whereby the infant would tend to be near his mother. Bowlby discovered that in order that children dare explore the environment around them, including having relationships with others than their mothers, they must construct a secure base, that is, they must have a reliable, responding, connected mother. Otherwise, children tend to become clingy, excessively demanding, crying all day and night when they are at home; when they leave home the daren't embark on adventurous excursions into the environment for fear they won't find their mothers if they want them or need them on their return. That constitutes a major drawback for socialization. Many become loners, and feel at a loss when faced with social occasions, at school or playing with other children. That is why they resort to television or computer games where they avoid having to interact with another human being, one of the most fearful actions they sometimes have to suffer. Attachment Research Center Juncal 1966 1116 BA, Argentina From: Wendell Piez Subject: Re: 10.0366 computers and play Date: Tue, 29 Oct 1996 12:12:49 -0500 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 138 (138) Play can't be taught, but games can. I find both the positions cited to be one-sided ("Teaching kids playground games is GOOD"; "Teaching kids playground games is BAD"). Lately I've been reading Seymour Papert's new book, THE CONNECTED FAMILY (Longstreet, just out) -- very enlightening on the general issue. He produced the LOGO programming language for kids and a package, MicroWorlds, which serves as a LOGO "development environment"; his perspectives are helping me open up whole vistas on my own scholarly activities, computing and otherwise (but just play after all). It's only a www site, but look at http://www.ConnectedFamily.com/ -- Wendell Piez **[Editorial note: In light of the discussion we are now having about books, publishing, and related matters, Seymour Papert's "companion web site" to his new book is highly significant. It suggests to me a paradigm for combining the virtues of both publishing media -- while not involving commercial publishers (and university presses that operate in the commercial style) in otherwise costly and uncertain experiments. --WM] From: Jim Campbell Subject: Re: 10.0369 real books (part 2 of 2) Date: Mon, 28 Oct 1996 18:44:15 -0500 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 139 (139) A couple of general comments: 1. All of this discussion assumes that electronic texts are delivered in 20 years in much the same way they are delivered now. The technology has changed dramatically in the last five years and I suspect it will continue to change. We can't state what the advantages and disadvantages of electronic vs. paper access in 20 years will be. 2. It also assumes stability in the publishing industry, but there are very real problems there and the survival of the book may ultimately be an economic rather than a technological question. Certainly the book will be with us for a while, I hope a long while, but I wouldn't take bets outside of 20 years. Then a few comments from a librarian on Robert Amsler's posting. How this will affect libraries is an interesting issue. On the one hand, libraries currently have the paper budget to buy books and journals for the whole university, so to speak. Well, my main quarrel with this is the tense. It is affecting libraries. We have for many years now devoted a portion of our budget to electronic resources, mostly CD-ROMs, and now are purchasing access to Internet resources for our University, including access to electronic journals and books for departments. Departments may decide this isn't working out too well as they now have more things to acquire directly and they have to pay to print them; so they may want some of that budget back--then too, departments are notoriously bad at keeping their literature organized, so they may want to pass the printed Web pages off to the library for cataloguing, storage and access. Some departments might decide that the library should be the ones to download the materials directly--i.e., by recommending web sites the way they now recommend journals. Then the library would be the one to monitor the sites for new publications. Again, all this is happening now, though I'm unclear why it's said departments are now buying more things directly - most of them have always done some duplicating of essential materials. I suspect few libraries are going to want to store paper printouts of materials or to download websites. We'd rather set up a Web page of our own that connects to key research sites for the disciplines we serve and/or make links to the sites in our Web based catalogs. And there is more stability on the Web now as more and more organizations put up materials, it's the individual sites that have been the big problem. If there's heavy local use, we'd rather have an electronic copy and put it up on a server, copyright allowing. That's what we're doing for reserve materials now. Many journal publishers, when they negotiate contracts with libraries for electronic journals, now guarantee that the library owns the years for which it subscribes, so that if the journal ceases or the library drops its subscription, it can download those issues or get a tape of them and continue to make them available locally. A real problem, incidentally, is that many of these contracts don't allow interlibrary loan, so researchers at smaller institutions may have trouble getting needed materials without paying the document suppliers. The issue of paper vs. electronic storage is also there. So far, NOBODY has told me they like to read large documents on the Web. This tends to say that while students may be forced to read things online, they will want the option to print them out, and may even be willing to pay for that (if they can afford it). The question of what happens when professors assign students to do Web-based research for a project seem to come up. If a whole class full of students needed access at one time; or toward the end of semester entire sets of classes were trying to complete reports to turn in by accessing the Web for their research--the demands on numbers of terminals available at one time would be quite high. I.e. libraries started with the terminals being the INDEX, used for a time to get references which were then tracked down in the real library; then terminals became an augmentation to the library for newspaper and other short articles; but now the prospect looms of the Web as the SECOND LIBRARY--one in which students and faculty will want to download (i.e. borrow) much larger articles and documents--or, less likely, stay in front of the terminal for the whole time while they read them; i.e. terminals will have to be as plentiful as chairs in the library or as visitors to the library building. All of this assumes that this research will be done in the library. We have in fact added a lot more terminals, but our computing center is also putting ethernet in the dormitories. Libraries can blunt the cost of having ample printers, administering the cost of printing, etc. by offering downloading and pushing the cost of printing off to the student's home computer; OR go into the printing role more actively by providing bigger and less expensive per page printing equipment to try and keep printing costs down (though equipment and operational costs would go up). Most libraries and computing centers are or soon will be charging for printing in the same way they now charge for photocopying. Universities faced with the Web as an essential part of education may have to resort to university web access facilities--far more extensive than existing computer labs, probably featuring less expensive Web computer terminals, intended largely just to provide access to Web pages, printing, etc. and no "computing" as we now use the term to refer to word processing, spreadsheets, database access, etc. Most universities are very reluctant to make that kind of investment in technology that is so quickly obsolete and are trying to figure out ways to place the burden on the students. These times they are a changing... They have done changed, at least in some places. And as with so many other things in the 90s, the trend is for them to change in ways that will be most acceptable to those who can pay. - Jim Campbell =09Acting Director, Systems and Networked Information University of Virginia Library, Charlottesville, VA 22903 USA campbell@virginia.edu * Tel: 804-924-4985 * Fax: 804-924-1431 From: Maarten van der Heijden Subject: Re: 10.0369 real books (part 2 of 2) Date: Tue, 29 Oct 1996 06:33:21 +0100 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 140 (140) I am very glad with this ongoing discussion on the book. Though I am mainly a reader I would like to react on what Ron wrote. At 22:02 28-10-96 +0000, you wrote: [deleted quotation]f [deleted quotation]h [deleted quotation] This last is a very strong point I believe in the ongoing discussion about the Book and Etext. I would mak ea slight modification to your statement.= =20 If you can print out an E-text without losing something vital, the author didn't realise which capacities this technology offered.=20 This is not true though for Email, which exists by virtue of the speed and editabillity it offers. From=20the early years of the use of the book we see that authors are looki= ng for new ways to order and make accessible their books, using indexes, footnotes, tables of contents etc.The choice to publish electronically obliges us to think about that technology as much as the early makers and users of books did. Maarten van der Heijden From: Haradda@aol.com Subject: Re: 10.0369 real books (part 2 of 2) Date: Tue, 29 Oct 1996 00:06:51 -0500 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 141 (141) I am going to put in my own two cents worth on this. I think that everyone makes too much of a big deal about reading etext on a computer. If you compose your papers on a computer or edit your books on one you are reading long etext. If you have a big display and the proper word processor or browser you can make the characters larger or the text scroll if you want t= o. I carry around ebooks on zip disks and read them on my laptop. I have been reading thru the "classics" for the last few years. Reading whole boo= ks rather than the selections that I read in my undergrad days. I have also been reading the children's books that I missed when I was younger as well = as reading those that I liked with my children. nightly. I must admit that I do print up some chapters per week when I read with my children. But still it isn't a big deal. This Christmas I am putting together an anthology of my favorite poems and short stories that I have enjoyed and rediscovered. I am printing up 50 copies that I am giving to friends as well as clients.=20 A far bigger problem is that fewer and fewer people read much of anything at all. And the level of their reading ability has fallen to quite low levels. My children's friends come over all the time to get etext books from my collection. Books that they need to read for school. Their teachers don't seem to expect much and the kids don't give back very much either. From: Willard McCarty Subject: books, body and soul Date: Mon, 28 Oct 1996 08:25:30 -0500 (EST) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 142 (142) In Humanist 10.367, Greg Lessard makes the useful distinction between=20 Technology/technology and Book/book, that is, between the conceptual=20 entity and a particular manifestation of it. He says, quite rightly,=20 that it's important to keep these distinct, and notes that I mix them=20 up, sometimes talking about one, sometimes the other. "In short," he=20 concludes, "we may have qualms about a technology, but we shouldn't=20 let this distract us from considering the Technology it exemplifies=20 and asking ourselves what its limits might be." Indeed -- a nice=20 statement of what I think Humanist is for. Then, he goes on to=20 discuss reading, distinguishing "three perspectives on texts:=20 consultative (looking up), discursive (reading sequences of text) and=20 esthetic (textual pleasure)." He finds that although these kinds are=20 useful to distinguish, the categories break down, e.g. when an=20 essentially consultative work (such as Diderot's Encyclop=E9die)=20 is treated as an aesthetic object, or when a discursive text (such as=20 Ovid's Metamorphoses) is consulted. On closer inspection he finds,=20 again quite rightly, that to be more precise about these things, we=20 have to mix up what we have distinguished. A contradiction? Apparently so, but it is the contradiction inherent=20 in our historical circumstance -- indeed, the philosopher would say,=20 inherent in our contradictory existence (and if this philosopher were=20 given the chance he or she would probably bring out the old=20 body/soul problem and take enormous pleasure in contemplating our=20 eternal return to basics). As computing humanists -- permit me to be=20 quite emphatic here -- our task is to be awake while in the middle of=20 the muddle and attempt as best we can to sort it out.=20 The stubbornness I hang on to, my rock in the storm, is the question=20 of why we should waste our time any longer in imitative modes of=20 thought. The "electronic book" is an "iron horse" we should start=20 thinking of as a "train". Forget the horse! Start asking what the=20 train can do that a horse could not, what the consequences of its use=20 are, and so forth. Then we can ask about all those liberated horses,=20 and perhaps have something to do with keeping the nutters from=20 convincing the Mighty that we should slaughter them all, or some other such wicked foolishness. The forces at work are certainly more than we can control, but we're=20 not totally without influence, and even if it is of no avail against=20 the economic typhoon, we will have understood something important=20 about the acculturation of technology -- and have refurbished an old=20 philosophical debate for the nintendo generation? Comments? WM=20 =20 ------------------------------------------------ Dr. Willard McCarty, Senior Lecturer King's College London / Strand / London WC2R 2LS +44 0171 873-2784 / Willard.McCarty@kcl.ac.uk http://www.kcl.ac.uk/kis/schools/hums/ruhc/wlm/ From: Marta Steele Subject: real books Date: Tue, 29 Oct 1996 08:52:56 EST X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 143 (143) Willard, There's a lot more to say than I, or probably anyone else, has time=20 to say on this vastly important subject. I will have more time later=20 (and hope I don't say too much then!) but right now I want to quickly=20 respond to Mr. Lessard's latest posting by saying, yes, well and=20 good, but in 2016 I hope they have figured out a way to make the=20 electronic medium far less ephemeral if it is fated to replace books.=20 I can envision electronic devices that imitate books in every way,=20 sit on our shelves, and besides that contain all the advantages we=20 currently enjoy on the bulkier, far less portable screens. It still=20 seems bizarre to me and far less esthetically pleasing than print on=20 a designed page, which, quite simply, won't flicker or fail. Just=20 yesterday I was reading from I a book I own that dates back to the late=20 1600s, an edition of Lucan's _Pharsalia_. The print on the page is=20 intact and thoroughly legible. As a matter of fact, the book shows=20 hardly a trace of wear. Of course, I haven't written in the margins=20 but they are filled with the marginalia that were current at that=20 time. I also have to add that I don't use the book every day but=20 neither do I need to encase it in glass or otherwise give it special=20 treatment. I don't mean to sound self-righteous but I consider that book my most prized and favorite material possession. I guess these paragraphs themselves place me in a specific era as a reactionary. So be it. People may read these in 100 years and laugh.=20 I reiterate, though, people are still very anxious to write books=20 rather than commit their publications to the internet. So my two=20 points are that publication on disk/screen has not yet superseded all the advantages we derive from books (longevity in addition to the "sentimental" perks) and the population is far from "sold" on the latter as a sure replacement. I'm still fascinated with the ultimate effects electronic publication=20 will have on (I'm admittedly inarticulate so early in my workday) the=20 intellectual directions our culture takes, but there are so many=20 other factors serving as roadblocks these days that perhaps the real=20 question must for its own sake put aside all these variables.=20 How will we evolve intellectually? =20 =20 From: PMC Subject: Postmodern Culture 7.1 (September, 1996) Date: Tue, 29 Oct 1996 23:53:02 -0500 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 144 (144) POSTMODERNCULTUREPOSTMODERNCULTURE P RNCU REPO ODER E P O S T M O D E R N P TMOD RNCU U EP S ODER ULTU E C U L T U R E P RNCU UR OS ODER ULTURE P TMODERNCU UREPOS ODER ULTU E an electronic journal P TMODERNCU UREPOS ODER E of interdisciplinary POSTMODERNCULTUREPOSTMODERNCULTURE criticism ----------------------------------------------------------------- Volume 7, Number 1 (September, 1996) ISSN: 1053-1920 ----------------------------------------------------------------- Editors: Eyal Amiran Lisa Brawley Graham Hammill, guest editor Stuart Moulthrop John Unsworth Review Editor: Paula Geyh Managing Editor: Sarah Wells List Manager: Jessamy Town Research Assistants: Anne Sussman Steven Wagner Editorial Board: Sharon Bassett Phil Novak Michael Berube Chimalum Nwankwo Nahum Chandler Patrick O'Donnell Marc Chenetier Elaine Orr Greg Dawes Marjorie Perloff Lisa Douglas Fred Pfeil Graham Hammill Peggy Phelan Phillip Brian Harper David Porush David Herman Mark Poster bell hooks Carl Raschke E. Ann Kaplan Avital Ronell Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett Susan Schultz Arthur Kroker William Spanos Neil Larsen Tony Stewart Tan Lin Allucquere Roseanne Stone Saree Makdisi Gary Lee Stonum Jerome McGann Chris Straayer Uppinder Mehan Rei Terada Jim Morrison Paul Trembath Larysa Mykata Greg Ulmer Special Thanks: Jennifer Hoyt ----------------------------------------------------------------- CONTENTS TITLE FILENAME Steven Helmling, "Jameson's Lacan" helmling.996 Veronique M. Foti, "Representation foti.996 Represented: Foucault, Velazquez, Descartes" Special Section--Psychoanalysis and Cultural Studies: Graham Hammill, guest editor Allen Meek, "Guides to the Electropolis: meek.996 Toward a Spectral Critique of the Media" Angelika Rauch, "Saving Philosophy in rauch.996 Cultural Studies: The Case of Mother Wit" Vadim Linetski, "Poststructuralist linetski.996 Paraesthetics and the Phantasy of the Reversal of Generations" POPULAR CULTURE COLUMN: David Golumbia, "Hypertext" pop-cult.996 HYPERTEXT: Matthew Miller, "TRIP" [WWW Version only] REVIEWS: Carina Yervasi, "Confessions of a Net review-1.996 Surfer: _New Chick_ and Grrrls on the Web." Review of Carla Sinclair, _Net Chick: A Smart-Girl Guide to the Wired World_. New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1996. Samuel Collins, "'Head Out On the Highway': review-2.996 Anthropological Encounters with the Supermodern." Review of Marc Auge, _Non-Places: Introduction to an Anthropology of Supermodernity_. New York: Verso, 1995. Jon Ippolito, "Whose Opera Is This, Anyway?" review-3.996 Review of Tod Machover and MIT Media Lab's interactive _Brain Opera_, performed at Lincoln Center, NYC, July 23-August 3, 1996. Thomas Swiss, "Music and Noise: Marketing review-4.996 Hypertexts." Review of Eastgate Systems, Inc. Theresa Smalec, "(Re)Presenting the review-5.996 Renaissance on a Post-Modern Stage." Review of Susan Bennett, _Performing Nostalgia: Shifting Shakespeare and the Contemporary Past_. London and New York: Routledge, 1996. Crystal Downing, "_Multiplicity_: %Una review-6.996 Vista de Nada%." Review of _Multiplicity_, directed by Harold Ramis, Columbia Pictures 1996. Brent Wood, "Resistance in Rhyme." Review review-7.996 of Russell Potter, _Spectacular Vernaculars: Hip-Hop and the Politics of Postmodernism_. Albany: Suny, 1995. LETTERS: Selected Letters from Readers letters.996 RELATED READINGS [WWW Version only] NOTICES: Announcements and Advertisements notices.996 ----------------------------------------------------------------- ABSTRACTS Steven Helmling, "Jameson's Lacan" ABSTRACT: This essay surveys Fredric Jameson's engagement with the work of Jacques Lacan. Jameson is one of the few among commentators on Lacan to foreground Lacan's cryptic and enigmatic prose style: Jameson's earliest mention of Lacan in _The Prison-House of Language_ (1971) departs from the premise that Lacan's writing offers an "initiatory" experience rather than systematic exposition; and Jameson's 1977 essay, "Imaginary and Symbolic in Lacan," climaxes with a celebration of Lacan's "discourse of the analyst" as an ethic for "cultural intellectuals"--a style of utterance closer to "listening" than speaking, more a speaking-with than a speaking-to or -of. The Lacanian scriptible (to borrow a term from Barthes that Jameson favors) enacts or performs Lacan's conviction of the irreducibility of particular speech acts to a paraphraseable "meaning," an %enonce% (or "letter") dissociable from the impulse (or "spirit") of the enunciation itself--a gesture that appeals to Jameson because just such irreducibility is what Jameson stipulates for "dialectical" writing as such. The success with which Lacan's writing resists what Jameson calls "thematization," the kind of commodification or reification to which written texts are specifically liable, exemplifies (Jameson hopes) a "utopian" resistance to ideology, or break-out from "ideological closure." But in _The Political Unconscious_ (1981), "ideological closure" is a premise of the argument to an extent that presupposes the impotence of any cultural production to break out of it. In this context, the book's subtitle, _Narrative as a Socially Symbolic Act_, implies the question whether "socially symbolic" must not mean "ideological": whether a "socially symbolic" protest against "ideological closure" can escape functioning as a confirmation of it. In the book's third chapter, Lacan is mobilized in ways that test this sense of "symbolic" against the specifically Lacanian evocation of "the Symbolic" as contrasted with "the Imaginary." The "Imaginary/Symbolic" binary figures, on the one hand, a fated devolution of desire and the libidinal into the "ideological closure" of "the Symbolic," on the other a more familiar ("Enlightenment") narrative of passage from irrationalism to critical reason. "Imaginary/Symbolic" transcodes in one way as "utopia/ideology," in another as "ideology/critique." In the tension between these two possibilities, Jameson maintains (one version or enactment of) "the dialectic of utopia and ideology," in which cultural production remains ever subject to ideological deformation, yet also resists and preserves the promise of deliverance from the closure of the ideological condition.--sh Veronique M. Foti, "Representation Represented: Foucault, Velazquez, Descartes" ABSTRACT: I examine Foucault's analysis of the %episteme% of representation with respect to Descartes's understanding (in the _Regulae_) of a universal %mathesis%, and to the self-representation of representation that Foucault traces in Velazquez's painting _Las Meninas_. I call into question Foucault's analysis of the painting as well as the critical observations of Snyder and Cohen, who take it for granted that Velazquez adhered to a univocal Albertian system of perspective. As to Foucault, I argue that his understanding (and assimilation) of vision and painting remains essentially Cartesian, and that he is insufficiently attentive to the materiality of painting which resists discursive appropriation. Finally, I examine what a genuine attentiveness to painting's materiality and to its irreducibility to a theoretical exploration of vision would mean for grasping the relevance of its specific order of %poiesis% to postmodern thought.--vf Allen Meek, "Guides to the Electropolis: Toward a Spectral Critique of the Media" ABSTRACT: The range of critical practices that currently circulate in academic cultural studies has yet to acknowledge the full scope of Derridean deconstruction. Now Derrida has published for the first time an extensive meditation on Marx, inviting renewed speculation about the ways that deconstruction might comment on marxian theories of the media. The figure of the specter, or ghost, that Derrida "conjures" in his tribute to Marx guides a critique of the media toward earlier encounters between marxism and psychoanalysis. These include the writings of Andre Breton and Walter Benjamin, recently discussed by Margaret Cohen as belonging to an experimental tradition which she names "Gothic Marxism." Like Breton and Benjamin before him, Derrida pursues a poetics of haunting and mourning that pervades the texts of Marx and calls for a "politics of memory" arising out of a sense of responsibility toward the ghosts of our collective histories. For Breton and Benjamin these included the ghosts of a revolutionary tradition that haunted the emergent phantasmagoria of commodity capitalism in modern Paris. Derrida addresses the collapse of Soviet communism and the "revolution" in global telecommunications. When placed in the company of Derrida's specters, can the Surrealist experiments of the 20s and 30s serve as a guide for a spectral critique of electronic media? Such a critique would call into question the legitimacy of the dominant technologies and ideologies of representation by reconstructing, in ways that owe much to psychoanalysis, their repressed histories. Anne Friedberg's study of cinema and shopping malls in Los Angeles provides a contemporary context for considering the legacies of Gothic Marxism. Like Cohen, Friedberg looks back to Benjamin's Arcades Project as a model for cultural studies. What is striking about the juxtaposition of these two recent responses to Benjamin, however, is that in Friedberg's analysis of postmodern culture we witness the disappearance of those darker social forces which it would be the project of Gothic Marxism to make visible.--am Angelika Rauch, "Saving Philosophy for Cultural Studies" ABSTRACT: This paper establishes Kant's aesthetics as a postmodern project as it expands on Kant's distinction between representative image and figure. "Figure" is the crucial term because it operates according to unconscious law's contingent resonant with rhetorical structures. From a psychoanalytic and feminist perspective, Kant's discussion of "wit" and "motherwit" appeals to the formative and creative nature of judgments on aesthetic experience. The author's thesis is that in aesthetic judgments, imagination reveals a structure of re-membrance which recreates the bond with the mother's body in the contingent feeling of pleasure. Taste is inherently a bodily faculty that, in analogy to the power of genius, translates affect into cultural images. Judgment of taste is the product of hermeneutic (i.e. mental and historical) process in which wit engages the cultural past in and through language to produce non-mimetic linguistic representations of emotional experiences: "figures" not images.--ar Vadim Linetski, "Poststructuralist Paraesthetics and the Phantasy of the Reversal of Generations" ABSTRACT: In its critique of patriarchy and logocentrism, and in its attempts to replace these with a plurality of identifications, post-structuralist theory enacts the very fantasy of the reversal of generations which, Freud explains, underpins the Oedipus complex. By developing Freud's notion of sublimation alongside both Bakhtin's notions of dialogism and Ernest Jones's theory of aphanasis, this essay argues for a genuinely psychoanalytic narratology that lies outside logocentric thought. One important significance of this argument is that it allows for an engagement with constructions of feminine sexuality without recapitulating an Oedipal paradigm.--gh David Golumbia, "Hypercapital" ABSTRACT: As relatively egalitarian, pluralist theories of hypertext (largely focusing on the medium's formal and mechanical properties) have been written in the academy, corporations have been shaping hypertext into a premier tool of capitalist development. Like many such tools, the World Wide Web is skewed toward Western ways of understanding and the Western economic base. But unlike other tools of this sort, the interplay between hypertext on the web and the varied and burgeoning mechanisms for electronic transfer of capital and credit suggests a more sinister development. For the distinction between the transfer of information and the transfer of capital is becoming blurred in the creation of what I call "hypercapital" which in certain crucial respects constitute a new form of capital itself. The body of the paper discusses the consequences of this blurring for liberal visions of information access, for the Marxian notion of circulation, and for the politics of the subject. The paper follows the recent web convention of embedding links to a variety of web sites, whose contents help to demonstrate the imminence (and the gravity) of the developments I discuss. --dg ----------------------------------------------------------------- POSTMODERN CULTURE is published by the Institute for Advanced Technology in the Humanities three times a year (September, January, and May). 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The World-Wide Web version of _Postmodern Culture_ is marked up using HTML (hypertext markup language), a DTD (document-type definition) of SGML (Standard Generalized Markup Language). ----------------------------------------------------------------- SUBSCRIPTION to the journal in its electronic-mail form is free. Postal correspondence and books for review should be sent to: Postmodern Culture Box 8105 NCSU Raleigh, NC 27695-8105 Electronic-text submissions and requests for free e-mail subscription can be sent to the journal's editorial address (pmc@jefferson.village.virginia.edu). SUBMISSIONS to the journal can be made by electronic mail, on disk, or in hard copy; disk submissions should be in WordPerfect or ASCII format, but if this is not possible please indicate the program and operating system used. The current MLA format is recommended for documentation in essays; a list of the text- formatting conventions used by Postmodern Culture for ASCII text is available on request. _________________________________________________________________ COPYRIGHT: Unless otherwise noted, copyrights for the texts which comprise this issue of Postmodern Culture are held by their authors. The compilation as a whole is Copyright (c) 1996 by Postmodern Culture and the Institute for Advanced Technology in the Humanities, all rights reserved. Items published by Postmodern Culture may be freely shared among individuals, but they may not be republished in any medium without express written consent from the author(s) and advance notification of the editors. Issues of Postmodern Culture may be archived for public use in electronic or other media, as long as each issue is archived in its entirety and no fee is charged to the user; any exception to this restriction requires the written consent of the editors and of the publisher. From: David Green Subject: Program Director, National Digital Library Federation Date: Wed, 30 Oct 1996 15:26:42 -0500 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 145 (145) NINCH ANNOUNCEMENT ****************** [deleted quotation] =============================================================== David L. Green Executive Director NATIONAL INITIATIVE FOR A NETWORKED CULTURAL HERITAGE 21 Dupont Circle, NW Washington DC 20036 www-ninch.cni.org david@cni.org 202/296-5346 202/872-0884 fax ============================================================== From: David Sisk Subject: Re: 10.0372 real books Date: Tue, 29 Oct 1996 14:58:44 -0600 (CST) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 146 (146) Perhaps I have missed the point somewhere along the line, but I'm having a hard time with the terms of the argument over books vs. e-texts being an argument about _reading_. E-texts offer several very real advantages in terms of preserving information in small amounts of space (say, rare or crumbling books), permitting rapid searching and indexing, and in making this material available more easily and quickly, copyright allowing. In my experience, the act of reading off of a computer screen "works" only for brief tidbits of information. The faculty and students I have worked with, here and at other institutions, print out nearly everything more than about three meaty paragraphs in length--including e-mail. This is especially true for those doing research, who plan to cite their sources and quote from them. The fundamental difference I see between texts in book form and texts in electronic form, as far as impact on the act of reading, is that any computer capable of receiving e-texts almost certainly has lots of other capabilities. Students and faculty tend to print material out for later perusal because there are other things to be done on the computer: other assignments or "fun" activities, such as games or e-mail. By contrast, there's not much beyond reading you can do with a book, other than making marginal comments, doodling on the endpapers and perhaps tearing out the pages to make paper sculptures . As long as computer technology continues to add more kinds of capability, I think computers will become _less_ likely to function as the primary vehicle for reading. _________________________________________________________________ David W. Sisk Assistant Director for Academic Computing Macalester College / 1600 Grand Avenue / St. Paul, MN 55105-1899 sisk@macalester.edu / Voice: (612) 696-6745 / FAX: (612) 696-6778 From: Mary Dee Harris Subject: Humanist reply Date: Wed, 30 Oct 1996 13:40:18 -0800 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 147 (147) Greg Lessard writes: <> WRT the question of whether we are too old (or at least middle-aged): I have a different perspective now from what I had only a few years ago. Not a philosophical consideration of the merits one way or the other, but a purely physical problem: I can't read a computer screen for very long without numerous strains -- eyes, neck, brain, . . . . I have difficulty maintaining my occupation (computer research consultant) because of these challenges despite numerous changes including special computer glasses, specially arranged furniture, larger fonts, and such. So my intellectual interest in the notion of electronic publication is tempered by my physical inability to deal with the medium. Another of the 'wise' guys viewing the elephant, I remain, Mary Dee Harris -- Mary Dee Harris, Ph.D. 202-387-0626 Language Technology, Inc. 202-387-0625 (fax) 2153 California St. NW mdharris@erols.com Washington, DC 20008 mdharris@aol.com From: Subject: Re: 10.0373 computers, play, and e-publishing Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 148 (148) I was personally apalled by the posting from (presumably a person at) the "Attachment Research Center" emphasizing the need for an infant to have a stable attachment to "his mother." While most of the offense I take proceeds from the disjuncture between my own politics and the gender specificity of the posting with regards to the roles of parents and the ideal gender of and infant (male), I am moved to write to our group because of the effectively anonymous source of the posting. If we are to be a community discussing issues, including those which occasionaly stray from our common focus of electronic technologies and the humanities, let's be a community of people. _Who_ wrote from the "Attachment Research Center?" The issue of identification and anonymity is relevent beyond a tangential discussion of child-raising practices and so my request is that we be a community of people identifying ourselves by name and (but not or) institutional affiliation. John W. Marshall Princeton University jwm@princeton.edu [Editorial note. If at all possible, I publish everything sent by members of Humanist, and some things from elsewhere. So although the above might, in less generous company, provoke flaming war, my guess is that it won't here. Two points, if I may. (1) All politics make for interesting study, but in a multicultural, international setting it seems to me that one has to be willing to see one's own opinions and remarks as possibly less than universally true and so couch them in those terms. (2) Humanist usually does follow the convention that the author of a note should identify him- or herself by name. Mr. Marshall is quite right -- this is a community of individuals. I slipped up in not asking the author of the note in question for his or her identity, for which I apologise. Many current Humanists could hardly be expected to know this convention, which as far as I am aware has not been discussed in years, so the fault really is mine. Finally, allow me to return us to the reason for talking about children's play in the first place, which was to ask, what can we as computing humanists (rather than fond parents or child psychologists or whatever else) learn from studies of children's play? Can we, for example, say that all pieces of software might usefully be seen as analogous to one's mother, father, or other caring entity, and that our behaviour with software is analogous to a child's recursive process of separation from a secure base and return to it? --WM] From: Kay Broderick Subject: Thomas Hardy Computer Study Date: Wed, 30 Oct 1996 16:13:04 +0900 (JST) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 149 (149) Is anyone (or anyone you know) working on Thomas Hardy's fiction using computer analysis or other computer-related work? I am, and would like to talk with others who are. Dr. Kay Broderick Kobe College, Japan kay@gol.com From: Monique Jucquois-Delpierre Subject: rumanian html Date: Wed, 30 Oct 1996 13:04:01 -0500 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 150 (150) Dear humanist and computer specialist, We are searching a confortable possibility/ software/ alphabet for the rumanian writing internet via Html, especially : s cedil, t cedil, circumflexe special rumanian. Maybe you can help us Monique Jucquois-Delpierre Heinrich-Heine-Universit=E4t D=FCsseldorf Studiengang Informationswissenschaft Department of Information Science [deleted quotation] From: Subject: CFP for CALL Conference Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 151 (151) Language Teaching and Language Technology Groningen (The Netherlands) 28-29 April 1997 CALL FOR PAPERS/PARTICIPATION Language Teaching and Language Technology 28-29 April 1997 University of Groningen Groningen, The Netherlands Call for Papers Computer-Assisted Language Learning (CALL) is enjoying a revival of interest after a disappointing first flurry of activity in the seventies. This is undoubtedly due to the broader range of tasks computers can now be put to, but it is also due to the practical success recent systems have been demonstrating. We hope that the conference may provide answers to some of the following questions: 1. How can language technology (speech recognition/synthesis, morphological and syntactic parsing/generation, semantic classification) be further harnessed in support of language learning? 2. How good is CALL compared to language learning without benefit of computer assistance? Can one measure improvements, and do these involve speed, proficiency or enthusiasm of CALL students? 3. Is computer-assisted learning always computer-assisted instruction? Isn't virtually all language-learning done under instruction? 4. What and where is the market for CALL products? How does one reach it? 5. What are the results of large-scale use of CALL in language education programs? When can it be effective? 6. What are the opportunities for long-distance learning? 7. What is the role in CALL for traditional support tools such as (analog) language labs, paper dictionaries, or hand-held grammars? 8. What are the pedagogical consequences of exploiting this technology? Are there mixed and/or partial options? 9. How may results of Corpus Linguistics be incorporated into CALL? 10. Are the different subfields of language instruction differently amenable to computer assistance--viz., reading, writing, speaking, listening, testing, translation? Although we solicit papers on all aspects of CALL, we are particularly interested in the question of matching technology to educational needs. The perspective of the program committee comes from language teaching and language technology. Language learning takes place primarily in classroom instruction, so that CALL therefore needs to convince language teachers of its value if it's to be used widely. The self-instruction market is relatively small, and CALL packages will need to allow language teachers a good deal of flexibility. On the other hand, language technology can automate irrelevant, tedious tasks in much the same way software for math education does, providing value to the language learner above drill and record-keeping. Invited Speakers (themes tentative) ---------------- Frank Borchardt, Executive Director, CALICO (Computer-Assisted Language Instruction Consortium). On Current Didactic Issues in CALL Stephen Heppell, ULTRALAB/Anglia Polytechnic University, Essex. On Educational Policy and CALL Lauri Karttunnen, Rank Xerox, Grenoble. On the Technological Horizon. Joke van der Ven, Wolters-Noordhof, Groningen. On the Publisher's Perspective. Abstracts --------- We solicit papers of 20 min (plus 10 min discussion). Abstracts of not more than 8 pp. (A4) including figures and references should be marked "Attention: CALL Conf." and submitted by Jan 15, 1997 to: Arthur van Essen, Applied Linguistics Postbus 716 Rijksuniversiteit Groningen NL 9700 AS Groningen The Netherlands Email submissions are likewise welcome. They must meet the same length requirement, must be either in plain ASCII or in postscript. Include "Attention: CALL Conf" in the subject line and send to call-conf@let.rug.nl Publication ----------- Proceedings will be published by CSLI press, Stanford University. Papers of not more than 12 pp. in length must be submitted (on paper and on disk) at the time of the conference. Demonstrations -------------- Proposals for demonstrations of existing work are likewise welcome. A demonstration time will be reserved. We suggest prepared demonstrations of ten minutes (which might be extended privately). Please be specific about hardware/software requirements. GLOSSER and HOLOGRAM, two Groningen programs, will be demonstrated. Program Committee (still tentative) ----------------- Paul Bogaards (Computer-Assisted Instruction, Leiden) Arthur van Essen (Applied Linguistics, Groningen, co-chair) Erhard Hinrichs (Computational Linguistics, Tuebingen) Sake Jager, (English & Computer Assisted Instruction, Groningen, co-chair) Franziska de Jong (Linguistics, Utrecht & Computer Science, Twente) Tibor Kiss (IBM, Heidelberg) John Nerbonne (Computational Linguistics, Groningen, co-chair) Local Arangements: Sake Jager, call-conf@let.rug.nl. From: "Dr. David Harrison" Subject: Re: 10.0377 books and reading Date: Wed, 30 Oct 1996 21:53:14 GMT X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 152 (152) One of the main problems with e-texts is the display technology. E-texts may well soon function more like books as most folk seem to find it easier to deal with the design of the book. Remember, the book was designed as a functional artefact over a long period. Monitor screens are rather new designs by comparison. In a few years flat white-screen LCD displays with very high definition and low white luminescence (books don't glow) will make reading an e-text a lot more like reading a book, perhaps using a Newton-like virtual book. In the meantime, it amazes me that so few people design workstations with the monitor built in to the desk, so you look down on to it. Although you can increase the font size in an e-text, they just don't have that nice book smell. :-) Dr. David Harrison. Roehampton Institute, London. http://www.pncl.co.uk/~prospero/ascpart.html From: Renee Landrum Subject: Re: 10.0377 books and reading Date: Wed, 30 Oct 1996 16:24:30 -0500 (EST) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 153 (153) [deleted quotation] Okay, so perhaps I'm an exception, then. I'm in the process of designing a website for credit (final project in an undergraduate special-studies). For me it's just as easy to cut-and-paste an article from Netscape into a notes file. I've got a database set up to handle things like this, so that I can go look up an electronic source just like I might consult an encyclopedia. Then, when I want to quote a source in my final work, I cut-and-paste again. Works for me, but then again I'm a techno-geek. To me, the *whole point* of having electronic references is that I don't have to generate excess paper, and that I can sort and search and catalog my notes easier on disk than on paper. Then again, I have a laptop... I think that as portable-computer technology advances (and gets cheaper), workstyles like mine will probably become more common... +O-Renee Landrum, Smith College, Northampton MA---slandrum@sophia.smith.edu-O+ "Don't resent your struggles; struggle is a victory. Through struggle, change occurs, and through change, liberation occurs." -Aishah Shahidah Simmons +O------------------------------------------http://cs.smith.edu/~slandrum---O+ From: Roger Brisson Subject: books and reading Date: Thu, 31 Oct 1996 07:59:44 -0500 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 154 (154) As I follow this interesting discussion on books and reading, I am continually reminded by many of the comments made thus far just how much this current revolution in transmitting the printed word resembles aspects of the Gutenberg Revolution of the late 15th century. In discussing electronic text, we naturally use the characteristics and values of the medium we are most familiar with-- the printed book. In the late 15th century the standard of comparison was of course the handwritten manuscript. Just as we are doing now, the point of comparison then was taken on many levels-- aesthetically, economically, technologically, and so on (Perhaps the exception is the theological: if I recall correctly, it was also questioned whether it was proper to print the Bible using the printing press). For contemporaries of Gutenberg, there was much debate as to the aesthetic qualities of the manuscript vs the printed book, and this drove the early printers to do all they could to reproduce as accurately as possible the characteristics of handrwritten manuscripts. In doing this it took some time to recognize that the printed book possessed aesthetic qualities that were arguably superior to manuscripts (not to mention the practical advantages, which were more readily recognized). Recently IBM introduced not a 6 pound, but rather a one-inch thin, 4 pound laptop with a strikingly sharp, vibrant color 12-inch screen. With its one gigabyte hard disk, it can hold several hundred books; indeed, with a cellular phone one can gain access to all the resources of the Internet. With this kind of technology I must admit that I have given up most of my (aesthetic) resistance to reading an electronic book in bed. Only the most expensive 'coffee-table' books could reproduce the rich colors that this IBM possesses, and the book of course is not in a position to infinitely transform its images as the IBM can. I suspect at in the 15th century there was also some question as to whether the manuscript or the printed book was easier to read. I'm sure it took some time getting used to reading the increasingly smaller fonts of the printed book, and many with poorer eyesight (and without reading glasses) had problems with this. I'm confident that as text display continues to improve in laptops the still common view that one does not read more than a few paragraphs with a computer will quickly disappear. As an aside, I find it interesting how many Web pages now available are using 'parchment' wallpaper backgrounds, reproducing the vellum qualities of the manuscript, to add to the richness of their sites. As digital technology continues its breathtaking development, it seems inevitable that we will come to view the printed book (at least those without high-acid paper) much like how those in the Renaissance came to regard the handwritten manuscript. While we are using the printed book to structure our thoughts regarding digital text, we are in danger of not recognizing the radical nature of the revolution in electronic text. A couple of years ago I published an article that was first made available via anonymous ftp. After announcing its availability on an electronic list, within a week the article was downloaded over 400 times by individuals around the world. This kind of rapid dissemination of ideas is now a commonplace on the Internet, and it is having a profound effect on how we do research (which in turn has had a noticable influence in many areas of society). The theme has been touched on in several postings already, but when viewing the printed book strictly as a 'container,' or vessel, of the the written word, I think it is possible to recognize the liberating impulse that electronic text possesses vis a vis the written word, and hence in transmitting ideas. Seen historically, the printed book was a pragmatic, technological achievement that allowed us to disseminate our ideas more efficiently, economically, and much faster than the handwritten manuscript, and the same forces are driving the revolution in the digital realm. The interesting exercise here, of course, is to speculate how the 'vessel' of electronic text will shape our ideas (with its dynamic, hypertext qualities), for it will certainly be much different than how the vessel of the printed book has shaped our ideas. Roger Brisson Penn State University From: Ron Tetreault Subject: re: books, body and soul Date: Thu, 31 Oct 1996 09:10:46 -0500 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 155 (155) Willard's analogy of the iron horse vs. the train is very appropriate to where we are now in defining the nature of the e-text medium. I'd like to add another: when it became possible to make moving pictures, early directors were content to set their cameras up and film a play just as it might unfold on the stage. But when someone decided the camera could move, scenes could be edited, and close-ups had punch, the cinema was born. What can we do in the new medium that we can't in print, and that is worth all our trouble and effort? --Ron ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ + Ronald Tetreault Tel: (902) 494-3494 + + Department of English Fax: (902) 494-2176 + + Dalhousie University Home Fax: (902) 453-4786 + + Halifax, Nova Scotia e-mail: tetro@is.dal.ca + + B3H 3J5 CANADA or Ronald.Tetreault@Dal.Ca + + http://is.dal.ca/~tetro/home/welcome.html + + learning by the (cyber)sea + From: Hope Greenberg Subject: Future of the book, of humanities Date: Thu, 31 Oct 1996 11:45:11 -0500 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 156 (156) Hoorah! Greg has voiced here one aspect of the book versus computer debate that has always bothered me: [deleted quotation] Who will control your scholarly future? Computer science nerds? Bill Gates? While humanists are fiddling Rome is burning apace. Well, let's not be needlessly alarmist. But I do a slow burn when I think of the time spent arguing about whether there will be books in the future. That will probably be determined by the likes of Harlequin and (fill in your favorite multi-national publishing conglomerate here) rather than by humanities scholars. Computing is providing more and more possibilities for humanist scholars. What can we do to encourage that and see it grow. Let's put a saddle on this beast and have some control over where it takes us instead of simply getting dragged in the dust behind it. Oops...sorry, clumsy metaphorical soap box mode off...back to the main thesis: Scholars who avoid or do not embrace information technology have no opportunity to shape that technology to their current or future needs, and they shut the door for their descendants. A sad prospect, indeed. - Hope ---------- Hope Greenberg University of Vermont http://www.uvm.edu/~hag From: Francois Lachance Subject: play and economics Date: Wed, 30 Oct 1996 22:45:24 -0500 (EST) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 157 (157) Willard, The play-game distinction is one of the most difficult terms to translate accurately. Its semantic field ressonates with a lot of cultural specificity even across the Indo-European group. Try it in Armenian, Latin, Greek, French, Italian and German and Irish. The tension between freedom and rule following is articulated in very many different ways on very many different occasions. Of course that tension is translated in computing and humanities terms as that between convention and creativity. .................................. Games and children and computers -- the topic reminds me of the agony of choosing teams or being chosen. It also reminds me of trading hockey cards (I grew up in Canada) and marbles. What I recall is as much actual trading of objects and forming of teams, as thinking through or dreaming about possible arrangements. I claim a good dose of modeling (play) in game behaviour be it of children or adults and especially in games that were cross-generational. Writing about agents in an economy, Deborah Vakas Duong writes in a 1995 a project report on "Computational Modeling of Social Learning" that The fuel behind this self organisation is not natural selection but symbolic interactionism. The report is available at http://www.virtualschool.edu/mon/Bionomics/TraderNetworkPaper Her modeling of economic behaviour of traders describes "emergent interplay of conformity and utility" In her discussion she points to the work of Terry Winograd and Fernando Flores who challenge the foundation of Artifical Intelligence in logic. She traces an analogy with the way children acquire language skills. Children invent the rules of lanuage for themselves, creating their language through experience. The agents of my simulation do the same: they make their world all together, not by an entrepreneur that is copied. They are all entrepreneurs in a changing world where utility and conformity are dynamically intertwined. Only that which is ever being created can ever change. She goes on to claim that the principles of the emergence of symbols have much to offer social science simulation and AI. What I believe may be of interest to Humanist readers is the conclusion she draws. To translate from an evolutionary program to a rational one, all that is needed is an observer. As fuzzy ideal types linearize, crisp objects could be defined to document their existence, if not to modify it. In the future, programming could become a mixture of reasoning and evolution, with simcity like environments to work with. What I want to export from this specialized discourse on genetic alogrithms is the role of the observer. This is the point where I believe logic and rhetoric converge to enhance our understanding of not only the processes of social organisation but also the interpretative moves of symbol users that inform theses processes. By the way a colleague in media studies reported that she and a high school chum when called upon to act as team captains always chose their teams starting with the poorest players. Easy to do with a finite pool of players. I want to finesse your question especially since there seems to be an assumption that child behaviour in games and play can model adult behaviour in the face of novelty. What happens in a play group when a stranger comes to play? Or in a less I-thou formulation: what happens to the activity of play when the number of players changes? I think this takes up some threads related to intellectual property, the nature of reading and modeling. What it weaves, I'm not sure. But the very basic question comes back: who gets to play (work/trade/interact) with whom and for how long. And then there is the question of who gets to refuse to play (and be spared the judgement of being anti-social or the play of name calling). observantly obediant to the call to contribute, -- Francois [Editorial note: For related material, see the superordinate page, http://www.virtualschool.edu/mon/Bionomics/ -- WM] From: Willard McCarty Subject: video games &c. Date: Wed, 30 Oct 1996 08:37:23 -0500 (EST) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 158 (158) Dr. Juan Carlos Garelli, in Humanist 10.373, comments that children who are deprived of a secure home will "resort to television or computer games where they avoid having to interact with another human being, one of the most fearful actions they sometimes have to suffer." His finding seems to confirm an early fear that computers would in general lead to increased social isolation. As I recall Sherry Turkle, in her popular book on the sociology of computer use, The Second Self: Computers and the Human Spirit (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1984), argues that computer-use often leads in precisely the opposite direction. (I am aware that at least some professional sociologists do not think much of this book, but it's all I have to hand or mind.) I observe that through Humanist and other such things we tend rather intensely to socialise, although arguably the interactions are safer than "real" ones. I say "arguably" because I know that these interactions can be as dangerous, or rewarding, as any in some senses. My question is, are we once again talking about the manner in which computers are used, rather than some inherent property of mediated communication? In our own sphere, this becomes the question of where instruction by computer is safer than in a face-to-face classroom, and therefore better for some students, where it is but a pale imitation of the Real Thing. The jury is still out on that one, yes? It seems to me that the answer depends very much on the circumstance. In an intelligent essay I just finished reading (as referee, so I cannot say who wrote it, &c.) the authors begin by describing the situation university teachers now face in the typical commuter-institution, with students who have jobs, families, and other strong commitments. This, they point out, is what we face, not the cloistered ideal in which there is a real choice between sustained tutorial instruction and the glowing screen. Under these circumstances, "what can we do with what we've got?" seems the right question to me. Answers? Comments? WM ------------------------------------------------ Dr. Willard McCarty, Senior Lecturer King's College London / Strand / London WC2R 2LS +44 0171 873-2784 / Willard.McCarty@kcl.ac.uk http://www.kcl.ac.uk/kis/schools/hums/ruhc/wlm/ From: Hope Greenberg Subject: Re: 10.0366 computers and play Date: Wed, 30 Oct 1996 14:59:46 -0500 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 159 (159) [deleted quotation] Apple is betting that what adults want kids to learn is problem solving, and what kids want to do is create games. At least that seems to be the general idea behind their soon-to-be-released program named Cocoa. Cocoa lets kids (or anyone!) program, problem solve, play, or create systems (pick your favorite buzzword) without learning complex syntax, indeed, without reading at all. It lets kids create characters (here's Wacko), animate them (make Wacko run), give them tasks (make Wacko jump a wall), extrapolate and generalize "if-then" situations (make Wacko jump a wall that grows and shrinks), all by example. You can model dynamic systems, try out "what if" situations, or just "play." You can then share your games with other Cocoa creators across the Internet. What has this got to do with humanities computing? Well, when I get my copy I'll let you know! But for right now it simply serves to reinforce the idea that computers are not television. We cannot assume that they will have the same impact (or lack of it) on the scholaraly world. That is, the joy of computing is not in the consuming, it's in the doing. - Hope ----------- Hope Greenberg University of Vermont http://www.uvm.edu/~hag From: Subject: Lady of May/presentation of texts Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 160 (160) There is now a lightly annotated text of The Lady of May, designed for use with frames-capable browsers (Netscape 2.0+, etc.), located: http://darkwing.uoregon.edu/~rbear/may/mayframe.html It's currently in use in a class project comparing various print editions (1598-1962) with the three online versions that I've done, in an effort to locate and delineate some of the rhetorical issues of text presentation online. I'm interested in reactions to the *design* of the page, and to feelings about reading online, thoughts about whether this presentation would be useful as a teaching edition, etc. Though I've heard before about the limited usefulness of not working in full TEI sgml, I want to hear about that as well, and any thoughts you may have on what is considered authoritative in e-text development, who is doing the considering in the preceding clause, and thoughts on whether teaching editions will be able to happily co-exist with scholarly editions on the relatively level playing field of the WWW. Also: I have heard that some 32 research institutions are talking of developing an Internet II, where they will be able to carry on their academic work in relative peace and quiet, so to speak, far from the busy streets of the bustling megalopolis of "Internet I." If this occurs, will there be a cultural division in publishing realms, with a TEI Shakespeare in Internet II, and Project Gutenberg's Shakespeare in Internet I? To what extent is academic discourse about the social class of those discoursing, and how does class affect the presentation of texts, on paper or on electronic media? Richard Bear rbear@oregon.uoregon.edu http://darkwing.uoregon.edu/~rbear/ From: Subject: Re: 10.0469 English textual database =3D LOB corpus? Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 161 (161) For the LOB have a look at: http://www.hd.uib.no/cd_info.html Information of how to get the corpora archived at ICAME can be found at: http://www.hd.uib.no/corpora.html Regards Elisabeth Burr At 19:23 26.11.96 +0000, you wrote: [deleted quotation] From: Subject: Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 162 (162) [deleted quotation]h [deleted quotation]--------------------------------------------------------------------------- Dr. phil. Elisabeth Burr FB 3/Romanistik/Gerhard-Mercator Universitaet Duisburg GH Lotharstrasse 65/47048 Duisburg +49 203 3792605/Elisabeth.Burr@uni-duisburg.de From: Subject: Re: Copyright Threat! Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 163 (163) The following message went out to the member societies of the Humanities and Social Science Federation of Canada. It seems that the threat outlined below is very real - our librarians are taking it VERY seriously, and the AUCC (Assn. of Universities and Colleges of Canada) has requested all Presidents of Canadian post-secondary institutions to make their concerns felt. I think the issue is serious enough to warrant international exposure, and a similar invitation to colleagues elsewhere to respond to those listed below. Peter URGENT - URGENT- URGENT The Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage has finished hearing witnesses with respect to Bill C-32 on Copyright and will proceed with a clause by clause examination this week and next week. The Federal government has repeatedly assured the educational and library communities that Phase II of te Copyright legislation would include at minimum a number of exemptions for educational and library purposes in order to provide the necessary balance between the interests of the user and the creators. We have just learned that the long awaited exemptions for educational and library purposes included in the legislation risk being eliminated. If this happens a reasonable and balanced compromise between the needs of creators and those of users of copyright material in educational and library settings will disappear. The AUCC in a letter dated November 22 to Sheila Copps states that "the government has come under enormous pressure from some creator groups to make major [last minute] changes to Bill C-32 which would either limit the applicability of exceptions to instances where no collective licensing is available, or substantially circumscribe the exceptions that are currently in the bill... [Those] changes would be totally at odds with the letter and the spirit of the commitments made to the [academic community]." Moreover, the letter also indicates that "the amendment advocated by various creator groups to limit the applicability of exceptions to instances where no collective licensing is available would constitute a fundamental change [...] and would render the exceptions in the bill virtually meaningless. ... Collective licensing complements statutory exceptions, but is not a substitute for them. " We urge you to write immediately to John Manley, Minister of Industry, and Sheila Copps, Minister of Canadian Heritage, both sponsoring the bill, and the members of the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage to ask that C-32 not be amended to exclude the educational and library exceptions. We would appreciate receiving a copy of your correspondence. You can E-mail it to Therese De Groote at degroote@hssfc.ca or fax it to (613) 238-6114. We thank you in advance for your quick response to this campaign. The addresses of the above-mentioned ministers and members of the Canadian Heritage Committee are the following Hon. Sheila Copps Minister of Canadian Heritage 12th fl., 15 Eddy St Ottawa-Hull K1A 0M5 Canada Fax (613) 994-5987 coppss@parl.gc.ca Hon. John Manley Minister of Industry CD Howe Building, East Tower 11th fl;, 235 Queen Street Ottawa-Hull K1A 0C9 Fax (819) 992-0302 e-mail manlej@parl.gc.ca Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage e-mail Monique Hamilton, Clerk of the Committee Not available yet Clifford Lincoln, Lib, Chair of the Comm lincoc@parl.gc.ca Gaston Leroux, BQ, Vice-Chair leroug@parl.gc.ca Beth Phinney, Lib, Vice-Chair phinnb@parl.gc.ca Jim Abbott, Reform abbotj@parl.gc.ca Guy H. Arsenault, Lib arseng@parl.gc.ca Mauril Belanger, Lib belanm@parl.gc.ca Pierre de Savoye, BQ savoyp@parl.gc.ca Hugh Hanrahan, Reform hanrah@parl.gc.ca Raymond Lavigne, Lib lavigr@parl.gc.ca Pat O'Brien, Lib obriep@parl.gc.ca Janko Peric, Lib pericj@parl.gc.ca tel. FAX (613) Monique Hamilton, Clerk of the Committee 996-0506 943-0307 Clifford Lincoln, Lib, Chair 995-8281 995-0528 Gaston Leroux, BQ, Vice-Chair 992-4473 995-2026 Beth Phinney, Lib, Vice-Chair 995-9389 992-7802 Jim Abbott, Reform 995-7246 996-9923 Guy H. Arsenault, Lib 995-0581 996-9736 Mauril Belanger, Lib 992-4766 992-6448 Pierre de Savoye, BQ 992-2798 995-1637 Hugh Hanrahan, Reform 995-7325 995-5342 Raymond Lavigne, Lib 995-6403 995-6404 Pat O'Brien, Lib 995-2901 943-8717 Janko Peric, Lib 996-1307 996-8340 Humanities and Social Sciences Federation of Canada 151 Slater Street, Suite 415, Ottawa, Ontario K1P 5H3 Tel: (613) 238-6112; Fax: (613) 238-6114 Email: fedcan@hssfc.ca From: Joseph Wilson Subject: Re: 10.0470 wordplay (Marchand's humor) Date: Tue, 26 Nov 1996 14:43:44 -0600 (CST) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 164 (164) Jim Marchand was joking when he wrote the following: [deleted quotation] joe wilson From: Jim Marchand Subject: etymologies Date: Wed, 27 Nov 96 09:43:00 CST X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 165 (165) I was surprised to find that my Isidorian (lucus a non lucendo) etymologies were not universally accepted. I am sure that avis `bird' comes from `a via' (no path), because the bird flieth the untrammeled pathways of the sky. Seriously, not to press too hard upon a point, discussions such as those about ticked off, etc. show how hard it is to nail down an `etymology' in these / those ephemeral times. Ask a friend the origin of `on the Q.T.' (meaning `on the sly'), or read what's his name in the Sunday Times, or try to make sense out of `mind your P's and Q's'. Again in a serious vein, since you cannot always use humor on the net, even if you are into those little emoticons (e.g. (|-); doesn't look humorous to me), I should be surprised if any of the Isidorian etymologies of the Middle Ages turned out to be `true', but they killed people and cats because of them, so they were serious. As to the origin of Nazi, you had to be very close and sensitive to understand what was going on, and there are few alive who lived through it. I think I could probably make a fair case for the following scenario. German had a few words in it like Schatzi `boy friend, lover' (not a real bad word), Schmutzi `dirty boy', Butzi `no-account boy'. In fact, in his review of Des Knaben Wunderhorn (a kind of sort of poem/song book), Voss wrote that Arnim and Brentano had filled it with _Allerlei schmutzige, butzige, nichtsnutzige Gassenhauer_ `all kinds of dirty, lascivious, useless street songs,' so you can see where Schmutzi and Butzi came from. When the NSDAP began to get started, it's biggest supporters were street gangs who roughed up the opposing party gatherings. They were called Nazis (Short for `national,' spelled `nazional', or perhaps for NAtional SoZIalist, etc. etc. Anyway, as often happens, the Nazis adopted the opprobrious name as their own. Voltaire is said to have said (though as far as we know he didn't): `Etymology is a field of study (une science) in which the consonants count for very little and the vowels for nothing at all.' And to trace popular expressions and abbreviations you have to have been there; even then you can argue. In the Middle Ages, where you could be censured for giving the attributes of God in the ablative rather than the nominative case, etymology was important, but how many of you watched the OJ case when Marcia censured Johnny for being a male chauvinist oinker when he called her hysterical, using the etymology of the word as her proof? Notice how many of the TV people approvingly picked up on this. Etymology is a grand tool; if Derrida can use annominatio, we all ought to be able to. Jim Marchand. From: Steve Taylor Subject: Re: 10.0470 wordplay Date: Wed, 27 Nov 1996 08:50:21 -0500 (EST) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 166 (166) Don't know if this was already mentioned, but no collection of acronym-derived words could exclude "radar," derived from "RAdio Detecting And Ranging" equipment. Steve Taylor Faculty Information Technology Center Emory University (404)727-8931 http://userwww.service.emory.edu/~ussjt/ From: "Sarah L. Higley" Subject: Re: 10.0470 wordplay Date: Wed, 27 Nov 1996 10:01:08 -0500 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 167 (167) Just an addendum to David Goldsteen and Pamela Cohen-- whose posting I found very amusing: I have students who swear that our most common four- letter obscenity derives from an army term: "for unlawful carnal knowledge," and other variants of that. What you've told me about cadaver and flos would help put this in perspective for them. Sarah Higley From: David Green Subject: CONFU MEETING Date: Wed, 27 Nov 1996 13:51:33 -0500 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 168 (168) NINCH ANNOUNCEMENT November 27, 1996 CONFERENCE ON FAIR USE MEETING - November 25, 1996 I am re-distributing Page Miller's account of the CONFU Meeting of November 25. This was expected to be the final meeting of this group, which has been meeting for two years, preparing guidelines for the fair use of digital materials in educational settings. However, to give participants time to distribute the proposed gudelines deeply into their constituencies, for discussion and endorsement (or not), the period for consideration of the guidelines was extended to May 19, 1997, when the final meeting of CONFU will be held. NINCH will be posting Peter Fowler's "Interim Report," the proposals and other contextual material on its Web Site (www-ninch.cni.org). A further announcement will be made when all materials are assembled. David Green =========== NCC Washington Update, vol. 2, #40, November 26, 1996 by Page Putnam Miller, Director of the National Coordinating Committee for the Promotion of History On November 25 the Conference on Fair Use (CONFU), which has for the past two years been exploring issues related to the application of fair use in the digital environment, met for what many thought would be the final meeting. The purpose of the meeting was to review the draft of a interim report on CONFU's work. Peter Fowler of the Patent and Trademark Office had prepared the draft report which summarizes the work of the last two years and which, when it is finalized, will be forwarded to Assistant Secretary of Commerce and Commissioner of Patents and Trademarks Bruce A. Lehman. And it is envisioned that Lehman will be transmitting the report to Congress to become a part of the legislative record. An important part of the interim report is the appendices which contain not only background material, such as the participants in CONFU, but also drafts of proposed guidelines for using copyrighted material for educational and library purposes in the digital environment. The interim report includes three proposed guidelines -- educational fair use for digital images, educational fair use for distance learning, and fair use for educational multimedia use. Four issues surfaced for considerable debate at the November 25 meeting. First, the consensus of the participants was that the period for review and endorsement of the proposed fair use guidelines should be extended from the draft's date of March 31, 1997 to May 19, 1997. This will allow for more substantial consideration by interested parties. Related to this was the decision that CONFU should have one more meeting to review the endorsements and to determine if the individual proposed guidelines had received strong and broad based enough support to merit their being called a CONFU guideline. Second, there was a lengthy debate on the degree to which the educational multimedia fair use guidelines have been, under the leadership of the Consortium of College and University Media Centers (CCUMC), moving on a different track from the other CONFU guidelines. There was particular concern that CCUMC had, prior to going through the CONFU endorsement process, taken the multimedia guidelines to the House Subcommittee on Courts and Intellectual Property of the Judiciary Committee and received the subcommittee's endorsement. Since a number of organizations that represent user interests have expressed problems with these guidelines, there is a question as to whether they will in fact gain the broad based support of CONFU. The determination of this will be left until May when all the endorsements can be evaluated. A third topic of extended discussion was on the interim draft report's omission of the electronic reserve system guidelines, which deal with a library's creation at the request of faculty members of electronic reserves that provide supplemental material for specific courses in nonprofit educational institutions. The draft report summarized the working group's deliberations on these guidelines and stated that at the September 6, 1996 meeting there was general consensus that the electronic reserve system guidelines had not received widespread acceptance even though some organizations had indicated that they would endorse them. At a number of CONFU meetings various representatives of publishers and authors had stated firmly that they did not believe that any electronic reserve system should be permitted under fair use. Because of this impasse, Fowler had decided to omit these proposed guidelines from the appendix. Some people argued that they were part of CONFU's work and should be in the appendix. Others felt that it would be confusing to include proposed guidelines were clearly not going to achieve broad support. Thus Peter Fowler decided to uphold the decision to leave them out of the appendix. However, it should be noted that several library and educational organizations as well as the Association of American University Presses had indicated support for the electronic reserve guidelines. Finally, there was the decision to change the wording in the interim report from guidelines to proposals. The final report will include the word "guidelines" for those proposals that attain sufficient support. What comprises "consensus" or "endorsement" was an issue that reemerged throughout the day with some general agreement that it meant broad based support from all of the groups -- publishers, authors, educators, librarians, and scholars -- that have had a vested interest in CONFU. The revised interim report will soon be available on the WEB page of the Office of Patents and Trademarks with instructions for sending endorsement letters. NCC Updates will provide the specific WED page address once the report it posted. *********************************************************** NCC invites you to redistribute the NCC Washington Updates. A complete backfile of these reports is maintained by H-Net See World Wide Web: http://h-net.msu.edu/~ncc/ *********************************************************** From: David Green Subject: CNI Interim Exec. Director Date: Wed, 27 Nov 1996 16:13:56 -0500 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 169 (169) NINCH ANNOUNCMENT November 27, 1996 JOAN LIPPINCOTT APPOINTED INTERIM DIRECTOR OF CNI [deleted quotation] From: Leslie Burkholder Subject: Re: 10.0472 evidence and argument? Date: Wed, 27 Nov 1996 21:25:37 -0800 (PST) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 170 (170) I'm not sure how this will be relevant to humanities computing but here are three textbooks you might want to look at Ronald Giere, Understanding Scientific Reasoning. Now in its 4th ed. Colin Howson and Peter Urbach, Scientific Reasoning The Bayesian Approach. (These guys are at LSE in the philosophy department.) Davis Baird, Inductive Logic Probability and Statistics Leslie Burkholder From: Charles Ess Subject: Re: 10.0472 evidence and argument? Date: Wed, 27 Nov 96 19:18:31 CST X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 171 (171) Willard: I see that you've already gotten some good responses to your query. Allow me to add a couple more. Drury College has been using a slim volume by Anthony Weston, _A Rulebook for Arguments_, 2nd edition, from Hackett, as an accompanying text in both our freshman-level writing/literature classes and in our sophomore-level Values Analysis classes (the latter being devoted largely to ethics and philosophical arguments there-about (?)); the Weston text is a minimal introduction to logic and argument, with a good glossary of elementary fallacies, and a series of chapters devoted to writing effective argumentative essays. The issues of argument and evidence receive good, if introductory treatment. Some instructors beyond the philosophy department do well with it - but not all find themselves prepared to use it effectively. If you want something more substantial, there are any number of critical thinking texts out there that offer good discussions. For the general undergraduate student, though, my favorite remains the very reliable Howard Kahane, _Logic and Contemporary Rhetoric_, now in its seventh edition. Kahane does nothing with sentential logic in this text (though he does have such a text under a different title) - but focuses instead almost entirely on informal fallacies and their ubiquitous presence in the media, textbooks, advertising, and political discussion. The course I've taught wrapped around this text I've characterized as a defensive thinking course - analogous to a defensive driving course: if you don't think for yourself, someone else will - and to their advantage. If you're interested in other critical thinking titles, I can come up with a few next week - they're sitting in my office, and Thanksgiving is upon us. As well, Stephen Toulmin has had considerable influence in reshaping how philosophers and others think about argument - focusing more on notions of warrant and evidence than traditional logical discussion of structure. I suspect there's an introductory text out there based on Toulmin's work - perhaps other Humanist readers know of one off the top of their heads? I'd have to check. Hope this helps. Cheers -- Charles Ess Drury College Springfield, MO 65802 USA From: "Mark Battersby (x2412)" Subject: Re: 10.0477 evidence and argument Date: Wed, 27 Nov 1996 16:52:38 PST8PDT X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 172 (172) Willard, I was interested to note that no philosophers replied to your question. Are there none lurking around out there? I suspect that the limited participation of philosophers in this group reflects that ancient and regrettable split between rhetoric and philosophy. A split that ironically critical thinking and argumentation theory is tending to heal. Critical thinking and informal argumentation has become a minor industry in philosophy almost comparable to the status of English composition classes in English Departments. I have been teaching critical thinking/informal argument for about 20 years and would recommend Ralph Johnson's and Tony Blair's book "Logical Self Defense" as a good an intro as any. On the other hand, the classic text which is used by both philosophers and rhetoricians in Stephen Toulmin's "The Uses of the Argument". Unfortunately I could not tell from your note exactly what kind of argument/evidence you were concerned with. I suspect that you were concerned with statistical reasoning--evaluating studies on computer use etc.. If so, I think you are right that the social science folk probably have better basic texts. One I know of is Evaluating information : a guide for users of social science research / Jeffrey Katzer, Kenneth H. Cook, Wayne W. Crouch. But there may be better and newer texts. Another interesting text with the right title is Kathleen Moore's "A Field Guide to Inductive Arguments" though she covers a lot more than statistical/empirical arguments (e.g. she has an excellent section on the evaluation of arguments by analogy). Hope that helps. ****************************** Mark Battersby Dept. of Philosophy Capilano College 2055 Purcell Way North Vancouver, B.C. Canada V7J 3H5 PH 604 986 1911 L. 2412 FAX 604 983 7520 From: Subject: The Reading Experience Database (RED) Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 173 (173) ************************************************************** THE READING EXPERIENCE DATABASE (RED) Laudant illa sed ista legunt - Martial (They praise those but read these) RED's Web address: http://www.open.ac.uk/OU/Academic/Arts/RED/ ************************************************************** RED launched on 23 November 1996 The Reading Experience Database (RED), run jointly by the Open University, UK and the British Library's Centre for the Book, was launched on 23 November 1996. RED will record evidence of every type of reading experience over the period 1450-1914. Initially it will be restricted to reading experience in the British Isles and reading experience of those born in the British Isles (so the reading of British travellers abroad and first generation British and Irish emigrants will be included) but later we hope to expand the range. Printed forms on which a reading experience can be recorded will be available from RED. At the same time RED will be launched on the Internet with a home page which will include an electronic version of the form (so that it will also be possible to send examples of reading experience to RED electronically). Anyone interested in a particular individual who lived at any time in Britain during the period 1450-1914 (and who left letters, diaries, annotated books, etc. which contain evidence of reading experience) should get in touch with one of RED directors listed below. RED is looking for volunteers to work their way systematically through such materials in order to record evidence of reading. We aim to keep everybody informed of developments in RED by issuing regular reports on its progress. Within a few years we hope to make the growing contents of RED available to all those who have contributed to it. Somewhat later RED will be made accessible to all interested parties. Further information and copies of the RED record form are available from either Simon Eliot or Mike Crump. Dr Simon Eliot, RED, The Open University, 4 Portwall Lane, Bristol BS1 6ND. Email address: s.j.eliot@open.ac.uk Mr Mike Crump, RED, Centre for the Book, The British Library, Great Russell Street, London WC1B 3DG. RED's Web address: http://www.open.ac.uk/OU/Academic/Arts/RED/ Cheers Simon _________________________________________________________________________ Simon Rae : S.A.RAE@OPEN.AC.UK Academic Computing Service : The Open University, Walton Hall : phone: (01908) 652413 Milton Keynes, MK7 6AA, United Kingdom : fax: (01908) 653744 The URL for the OU's WWW home page is : http://www.open.ac.uk/ From: Subject: Re: 10.0479 wordplay Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 174 (174) [deleted quotation] And, of course, SCUBA: Self-Contained Underwater Breathing Apparatus. I wonder if this string has not, perhaps, reached its rather frayed conclusion.... --------------------------- Matthew C. Hansen University College - Oxford Oxford OX1 4BH univ0280@sable.ox.ac.uk From: Subject: Argumentation, debate, etc. Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 175 (175) According to what angle you are taking, there are many good books on the subject. My favorite textbook was always Austin J. Freeley, _Argumentation and Debate_ (San Francisco: Wadsworth, 1961), undoubtedly now out of print and date, though such things rarely change. For a philosophical approach, try C. Perelman and L. Olbrechts-Tyteca, _Traite de l'argumentation_, 2 vols. (Paris: PUF, 1958). Dense but rewarding. Back when I was in the teaching business, I used to give the students a list of the medieval _argumenta_ (argumentum ad verecundiam, ad hominem, ad captandum, etc.) and let them take apart political speeches, books, others' articles, etc. This approach works fairly well, though the last election would have furnished them with information overload. There is even a netsite devoted to argumenta somewhere out there, and I posted somewhere a list of about 50 medieval argumenta. It is even useful to invent them; e.g., the argumentum more Luciae: Linus and Lucy are walking along the sidewalk and he sees something lying there. "Gack! What's that?" Lucy: "It's one of those butterflies which fly up here each year from Brazil, etc." Linus picks it up: "It's only a potatoe chip." Lucy: "How in the world did that get all the way up here from Brazil?" Never give up your presuppositions. Jim Marchand. From: Olaf Pluta Subject: Abbreviationes for Windows Date: Mon, 2 Dec 1996 13:04:50 +0200 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 176 (176) It may be interesting for you to know that Abbreviationes, the first electronic dictionary of medieval Latin abbreviations, which has been originally developed for the Mac OS, can now be run on all major OS platforms including DOS, Windows, OS/2, Linux, and NeXTstep. For detailed information on the system requirements please refer to the Abbreviationes web page which can be found at: http://www.ruhr-uni-bochum.de/philosophy/projects/abbrev.htm Best wishes, Olaf Pluta pluta@scriptorium.ping.de From: Claire Smith Subject: Brepols Publishers on Web Date: Mon, 2 Dec 1996 10:40:39 -0500 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 177 (177) Brepols Publishers now has a complete catalogue on the Web at: http://www.brepols.com/publishers There is information on series, periodicals and CD-ROM. Recent titles are listed as well as works in print. Claire. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Claire Smith / Computing in the Humanities & Social Sciences (CHASS Facility) University of Toronto/ Robarts Library, 14th Floor / 130 St. George Street Toronto, Ontario, M5S 1A5 / Phone: (416) 978-2535 / Fax: (416) 978-6519 Internet: csmith@chass.utoronto.ca URL: http://www.chass.utoronto.ca:8080/~csmith/ From: Willard McCarty Subject: University Affairs survey Date: Mon, 2 Dec 1996 22:35:02 -0500 (EST) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 178 (178) Humanists may be interested in the results from a recent survey conducted jointly by University Affairs, a publication of the Association of Universities and Colleges of Canada / Association des Universite/s et Colle/ges du Canada (AUCC), and the AUCC/CARL Task Force on Scholarly Communications. A summary is to be found online, at the URL http://www.aucc.ca/english/university/carl-sum.htm (English) and http://www.aucc.ca/francais/university/carl-sum.htm (French). As Web wizards will suspect, the AUCC site itself is at the URL http://www.aucc.ca/. A nice piece of work. WM ------------------------------------------------ Dr. Willard McCarty, Senior Lecturer King's College London / Strand / London WC2R 2LS +44 0171 873-2784 / Willard.McCarty@kcl.ac.uk http://www.kcl.ac.uk/kis/schools/hums/ruhc/wlm/ From: lbeltran@servidor.unam.mx Subject: Date: Thu, 28 Nov 1996 20:23:22 -0600 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 179 (179) [Unfortunately I received the following in a rather poor state; my attempt to repair it may have obscured important parts of an address or two. Apologies if anyone or anything is misled. --WM] International Meeting Logic and Mathematical Reasoning Mexico City, September 30th - October 2nd, 1997 Organized by Departamento de Matematicas de la Univ. Nac. Autonoma de Mexico (Mexico) Departamento de Filosofia de la Univ. Autonoma Metropolitana (Mexico) Centre Francois Viete dHistoire et de Philosophie des Sciences, Univ. de Nantes (France) Department of Mathematical Sciences, George Mason University, Fairfax, Virginia (USA) Scientific Committee Carlos Alvarez (UNAM), Jean Dhombres (C. F. Viete), Marco Panza Daniele C. Struppa (G. Mason Univ.), Guillermo Zambrana (UAM) Our meeting will be dealing with the following general question: What makes of a reasoning a mathematical reasoning? This question might be formulated in one of the two following ways: 1) As a normative question. It would be then necessary to provide an answer, stating how a reasoning should be in order to be classified as mathematical. 2) As a historical question. The answer should then be given by stating the particular attributes of mathematical reasoning as they occur in history. A closer look at these two approaches seems to show that neither one is completely satisfactory. The first is based on the assumption that mathematical reasoning should satisfy certain conditions that finally appear as completely arbitrary. The second one requires that we should trust history as being able to provide by itself the object of our reflection. It is our belief that the two approaches should work together: the object of the epistemological research on the nature of mathematical reasoning comes out along with this same research through the possibility of finding an intrinsic characteristic which is common to all ways of reasoning displayed in texts and books considered as mathematical. This is why we think that no philosophy of mathematics is possible if it is conceived independently of the history of mathematics, and, in the same vein, no history is possible without philosophy. Therefore, the problem we address is how to recognize an intrinsic characteristic which is common to those ways of reasoning occurring in mathematical literature. It seems to us that this characteristic can be expressed as a logical structure, even if the term logic used here has to be embedded into a broader sense and refered not only to meaning it has in formal modern logic. Above all, our concern is not history of logic, nor history of the formalization of mathematical reasoning. Rather we want to study the forms of certain arguments, inferences, or discourse recognized as mathematical and investigate their differences or similarities. Participation in this meeting is open to every scholar who wishes to give a 40 minutes talk. Please send a one page abstract before April 30, 1997, with the included Registration Form. The acceptance of the manuscript will be decided by the scientific committee within a month after reception of the abstract. The abstract and the registration form should be sent to one of the following addresses: - Carlos Alvarez, Departamento de Matematicas, Fac. Ciencias, UNAM. Mexico D.F., c.p. 04510 M=E9xico; e-mail alvarji@servidor.unam.mx - Marco Panza, Centre F. Viete, Univ. Nantes, Fac. des Sciences, 2 rue de la Houssiniere, 44072 Nantes 03, France; e-mail = panza@unantes.univ-nantes.fr It is possible to send a one sheet abstract, together with the following information: Name, Institution, Adress (including electronic adress) to the conference adress: logical@hardy.fciencias.unam.mx It is also possible to connect to the meeting home page at http://hardy.fciencias.unam.mx:80/logical and submit the abstract and the registration form by using the relative links Admission fee is fixed at $50.00 U.S. ($15.00 US for students). This fee should be paid in Mexico City just before the conference. The meeting will take place in Mexico City. Participants may lodge in one of the several hotels in the city with prices ranging between $30.00 and $70.00 US A list of hotels close to the meeting center will be sent with the acceptance of the talk. The organizing committee will be in charge of reservations. It is possible to eat in Mexico City at a good restaurant, prices range between $15.00-25.00 US At the present moment, confirmed speakers for plenary lectures are: Jean Dhombres (Universite de Nantes) Solomon Feferman (Stanford University) Michel Otte (University of Bielefeld) Hourya Sinaceur (CNRS Paris) Jean Michel Salanskis (Universite de Lille) Daniele Struppa (Georg Mason University) From: Pamela Cohen Subject: call for papers Date: Mon, 02 Dec 1996 11:04:24 -0500 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 180 (180) [deleted quotation]__________________________________ Pamela Cohen Center for Electronic Texts in the Humanities 169 College Avenue, New Brunswick NJ 08903 phone: (908) 932-1384 / fax: (908) 932-1386 http://www.ceth.rutgers.edu pac@rci.rutgers.edu From: Yorick Wilks Subject: 1st International Workshop on Human-Computer Conversation Date: Mon, 2 Dec 1996 12:57:54 -0500 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 181 (181) --2nd posting CALL FOR PAPERS AND DEMONSTRATIONS 1st INTERNATIONAL WORKSHOP ON HUMAN-COMPUTER CONVERSATION Bellagio, Italy, 14-16 July, 1997 http://www.dcs.shef.ac.uk/research/ilash/Meetings/Bellagio/ We have received many expressions of interest in this workshop, both from the commercial sector and from academia. As a result we are now pleased to announce that the workshop will definitely go ahead on the above dates. Registration details soon via next mailing and on the WWW page. For the benefit of those who may have missed the earlier announcement, this workshop will survey and demonstrate techniques for practical, plausible, human-computer conversation. The workshop will be in the spirit of the Loebner Competition meetings, but will not constitute any kind of "Turing" competition under controlled deception conditions. It will, however, provide an opportunity for extensive demonstrations of working conversational systems, preferably those without domain restrictions. The meeting is not intended to be yet another get together on linguistic methods for dialogue modelling or human-computer interaction, but rather based on the assumption that, in many places, great strides are being made in real conversation simulations from a range of practical techniques and points of view, and that everyone working in this field would benefit from face-to-face interaction, as well as exploring the industrial/commercial applications of these technologies in HCI/WWW environments. In addition to the formal papers and the demonstrations of working systems there will also be panel discussions on the state of the art. CONFERENCE VENUE: The conference venue is the Grand Hotel Villa Serbelloni, in Bellagio, Italy, on Lake Como, the legendary site of Pliny's villa where the two arms of the lake meet. Bellagio is one of the most beautiful spots in the world and is easily reached from Milan. The date, 14-16 July 1997, immediately follows the EACL/ACL in Madrid. WORKSHOP PAPERS: This announcement is the first call for papers. We are also inviting applications from those who wish to demonstrate working systems. Papers may be submitted on any aspect of human-computer conversation, ranging from "How-to-do-it" to something far more abstract. The emphasis should be on the software techniques for communication in natural language and NOT on speech recognition or speech synthesis as such, although descriptions of systems capable of intelligent speech communication would be welcomed. SUBMISSIONS OF PAPERS: Contributions are invited from authors who have new ideas, results or ongoing work to report on any aspect of human-computer conversation. Papers should ideally be 3,000 to 4,000 words in length and will be refereed within 8 weeks. The accepted papers will be published in the conference proceedings. Submissions (3 hard copies or one e-mail copy) should be sent to Yorick Wilks at the address below, to arrive no later than March 29th 1997. Authors will be notified of acceptance or rejection by May 27th 1997. Authors of accepted papers will be requested to make their contribution available in machine-readable form (Word Perfect, MS Word or ASCII formats are acceptable), to be received by June 17th 1997. DEMONSTRATIONS OF WORKING SYSTEMS Demonstrations of, and discussions about, working systems will form the mail emphasis of the workshop. Statements of intent are solicited to demonstrate working systems which permit a user to converse with a program, either in a single subject domain or on a less restricted basis. Such statements should consist of a system description in 1,000 words or less, together with a specification of what hardware will be required to demonstrate the system. (The hardware spec is not necessary for those who plan to bring their own computer.) A sample of a conversation actually conducted by the system would be helpful but is not essential. WORKSHOP ORGANIZERS: The workshop is being organized by Intelligent Research Ltd of London, who will assist participants with room reservations at hotels in all price categories, as well as with transportation (if required) from the nearest airports. WORKSHOP COMMITTEE: Yorick Wilks, Sheffield University, UK Bruno Alabiso, Microsoft, US Ken Colby, UCLA, US Louise Guthrie, Lockheed Martin, US Koiti Hasida, ETL, Japan David Levy, Intelligent Research, UK Livia Polanyi CSLI, Stanford University, US Oliviero Stock, IRST, Trento, Italy Marilyn Walker, AT&T Bell Labs/Lucent Technologies, US ********************************* Professor Yorick Wilks AI and NN Research Group, Department of Computer Science University of Sheffield Regent Court 211 Portobello St., Sheffield S1 4DP UK phone: (44) 114 282 5561 fax: (44) 114 278 0972 email: yorick@dcs.shef.ac.uk www: http://www.dcs.shef.ac.uk/People/Y.Wilks ********************************* From: Subject: Re: 10.0425 Potter's Cold & al. Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 182 (182) At 18:34 15-11-96 +0000, you wrote: [deleted quotation]If BBC didn't prove successfull: Cold Lazarus was just on TV in Holland try email www@vpro.nl best of luck Maarten van der Heijden From: Subject: pragmatics of programming Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 183 (183) Um, this is really dumb but...will all those inclined to submit useful URLs to the list please *not* put them at the end of a sentence, followed by a full stop. The point-and-click routine in Eudora 1.5.4 persists in reading the full stop as part of the URL whereupon most http servers give an error message. E.g. (just the latest): http://www.maa.org/t_and_l/ would succeed, but I got an error because it was written http://www.maa.org/t_and_l/. By the way, COBOL always struck me as aesthetically designed for bankers who were nervous about computer code. Those responsible for creating the language either were insane or had some such ulterior motive. How else to explain source code syntax like (to take a random example from my old textbook) "MULTIPLY GROSS BY .0585 GIVING FICA ROUNDED." -- Charles L. Creegan N.C. Wesleyan College ccreegan@ncwc.edu http://www.ncwc.edu:80/~ccreegan From: Subject: Re: 10.0476 copyright threat Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 184 (184) Certainly efforts should be made to preserve fair use for education as exceptions in the proposed Canadian copyright legislation, but if that effort fails, librarians and individual scholars should be prepared for more direct action. Most publishers of academic and scholarly books rely on library subscription sales for their fundamental market. Scholars and academics, including course adoptions, account for the bulk of remaining copies sold. If the publishers, through their influence over legislation, insist on making new works unusable for scholarly purposes by overly restrictive copyright laws, an appropriate response would be a boycott. The day this law goes into effect, all library subscriptions should be cancelled and individuals should refuse to either purchase new works or adopt them for classes until the law is changed. As end users, scholars do have some power if only we will use it. If we don't, then how much sympathy do we deserve? William E. Grant Bowling Green State University [deleted quotation] From: Richard Caccavale Subject: The Marriage of Writers and Critics Date: Tue, 3 Dec 1996 11:05:17 -0700 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 185 (185) Please post the following Call for Papers to Humanist. Although it may not seem relevant at first, one of our considerations is the effect of hypertext on the author and reader. This is explained below. ------------------------------------------- Please reply to Cridifferences@du.edu for more information on this post. Reconcilable (In)Differences: The Marriage of Writers and Critics In honor of the 50th anniversary of the Writing Program at the University of Denver, the Creative Writing Program, in conjunction with the Academic Literature Program, is sponsoring a conference to explore the growing schism between writers and critics. Mission Statement Pressures of professionalization for writers have led to an increase in the number of degree-granting institutions for poets, essayists, dramatists, and fiction writers hoping to work in the Academy. As a result, writers in the Academy are engaging, often for the first time, with literary and philosophical theoretics sometimes at odds with their own position as would-be craftspeople. Likewise, professional critics, theorists, and academics find themselves in the position of being surrounded in the university setting by individuals who challenge much of contemporary critical perspective in favor of a return to a craft-oriented reading of a work. What does all this mean, then, for the writer, the critical theorists, and the process of hermeneutics in particular? The re-emergence of the writer/critic and the critic/writer highlights the late twentieth-century schism that seems to have widened steadily between the two disciplines. As graduate writers increasingly mix with graduate theorists, academia must turn its attention back to the roots of critical inquiry in an effort to reverse, somehow, the resulting fragmentation of its departments into scattered and often highly specialized camps. This conference will allow a continuation of recent attempts to reconcile both halves of contemporary literary thinking--affording both academics and writers an opportunity to speak to the future of textual concerns in this thickening climate of professional and pre-professional integration. The current academy, in that it plays host to both critical and creative endeavors--often originating from the same individual(s)--has become a hotbed of this type of theoretical debate. Yet as visiting writer Amitav Ghosh noted recently, "creative writers and literary critics have never been farther apart than they are today." The purpose of this conference will be to provide a forum for both critical and "creative" theoretics. The new millennium promises sweeping changes in the Academy with concomitant changes in literary theory and practice. What we are looking for are ideas which engage and further this debate, and which will illuminate, perhaps, a common ground upon which the problems of textual studies can be collectively identified and discussed. Topics for Investigation * The Role of the Writer / The Role of the Theorist in Textual Studies * Limiting or Delimiting Interpretation: Hermeneutics, Philosophy, and the Elusive Text * Narratology in the Post-Colonial and New Historical Climate * New-Formalism, Re-Formalism, and Contemporary Theoretical Investigation * Professionalization in Writing and Critical Theory * Hypertext and the Authority of the Author / Critic * Creative Works for Open Reading * Undergraduate Submissions are Encouraged Plenary Speakers and Associate Writers Confirmed Plenary Speakers: * Gerald Graff: the George M. Pullman Professor of English and Education at The University of Chicago and author of Literature Against Itself, Beyond Culture Wars, Professing Literature, and The Myth of Cultural Decline * Marjorie Perloff: the Sadie Dernham Patek Professor of Humanities at Stanford University and author of Wittgenstein's Ladder: Poetic Language and the Strangeness of the Ordinary, Radical Artifice: Writing Poetry in the Age of Media, and The Poetics of Indeterminacy among others. University of Denver Associated Writers: * Brian Kiteley: Director of DU Writing Program and author of: I Know Many Songs, but I Can't Sing, and Still Life with Insects * Rikki Ducornet: author of Phosphor, Dreamland, Jade Cabinet, Fountains of Neptune, Entering Fire: The Stain, and Complete Butcher's Tales * Beth Nugent: author of Live Girls!, and City of Boys * Bin Ramke: editor of Denver Quarterly and author of, Difference Between Night and Day, Erotic Light of Gardens, Language Student, Massacre of Innocents, and White Monkey * Cole Swensen: It's Alive She Says, Park, and translator of Allures Naturelles by Pierre Alferi Conference Logistics The conference will be held at the University of Denver from Friday, April 4th until Sunday, April 6th, 1997. There will be cocktail party and a banquet dinner. Registration Information Registration Fees: Thru 3/1/97, $50 faculty; $35 grad/undergrad. After 3/1/97, $75 faculty; $50 grad/undergrad. Please visit our web site at: http://www.du.edu/~rcaccava/conference.html for registration information. Call For Papers Panels will consist of a series of twenty minute papers. The Denver Quarterly has agreed to publish selected papers and creative works. Please submit one-page abstracts by January 20, 1997. Submissions should be mailed to: Department. of English Attn: Reconcilable (In)differences Pioneer Hall, Room 414 2140 S. Race, Denver CO 80208 or emailed to: critdifferences@du.edu Organizers and Advisors Faculty Sponsor: Brian Kiteley Faculty Advisory Committee: *Elenor McNees *Diana Wilson *Jan Gorak *Elizabeth Wolf *Eric Gould *Bin Ramke Contact Information For more information email: critdifferences@du.edu or write to the address above From: Peter Liddell Subject: FLEAT III Call for Participation Date: Tue, 3 Dec 1996 15:04:21 -0800 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 186 (186) INTERNATIONAL C.A.L.L. CONFERENCE The following is a short version of the Call for Participation for FLEAT III Dates: August 12 -16th 1997. Place: University of Victoria, BC Canada. The full version of this announcement, with descriptions of presentation criteria and other useful information, is available on-line at the following URL: http://web.uvic.ca/hrd/fleat3 We will also be pleased to email the full version to anyone who wants a copy. Just send email to fleat3@uvic.ca and ask for the Call for Participation. On-line Registration will be available in the New Year. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * FLEAT III - Languages, Resources, Cultures August 12 - 16, 1997 in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada CALL FOR PARTICIPATION In 1997 the conference on Foreign Language Education and Technology (FLEAT) will be held in North America for the first time. Based on the success of the first two events - both of which were held in Japan in 1981 and 1993 - the Learning Laboratories Association (LLA) of Japan and the International Association for Learning Laboratories (IALL) decided to jointly sponsor FLEAT III in Victoria, B.C. Canada. The conference theme of Languages, Resources and Cultures echoes the role of the Language Resource Centre as provider of language learning resources, technology for language learning, and, increasingly, as centres for cultural studies. The LRC theme also revolves around people - those members of our community who teach, create and provide resources, work with technology, and keep our Centres going throughout the year. The goal of FLEAT III is to provide an international forum where we can all meet, share our professional experiences, learn from one another and extend our knowledge of technology as it relates to language learning. Topics for papers at FLEAT III may be on any aspect of Technology and Second Language Learning, such as: * management issues; * facility design; * selection of hardware and software; * distance education; * integrating software into courses; * software assessment; * authoring software; * staff training and professional development; * relations within the institution; * technology and the theory of Second Language Acquisition; * international legal issues (copyright for example); * professional development; * courseware development The FLEAT III Program Committee is looking for proposals to present workshops, roundtable discussions, demonstration/poster sessions, lectures, and panel discussions. DEADLINE: All proposals must be postmarked no later than January 31, 1997. and (except those from Japan, which go to LLA) sent to: Program Committee, FLEATIII, Language Centre, Clearihue B 045, University of Victoria, P.O. Box 3045, VICTORIA, BC, Canada V8W 3P4 For more information or to request a full email version of the Call for Participation, please email fleat3@uvic.ca or point your favourite browser at http://web.uvic.ca/hrd/fleat3 See you in Victoria in '97 From: Subject: Project Gutenberg Newsletter Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 187 (187) This is the Project Gutenberg Newsletter for December, 1996 This is probabaly the last Newsletter that is going to the OLD server; at gutnberg@postoffice.cso.uiuc.edu. . .if you want to delete yourself ... . .there is probably no need, but you should ask me about" listproc@ prairienet.org if you haven't changes your subscription. *** Well, my link to uiarchive is finally back up, so the November Etexts should be on all our major sites, as below, by the time you see this. I am not sure when the international sites do their mirroring but the US sites should all be ready to go. My apologies, many of our links, drive, and computers have been down, all week long. My apologies, also, for the fact that the CBC told me my interview would be on the air on Thanksgiving [Canadien OR American]. . .but they JUST called and told me it would be on the CBC and PRI tonite at 7:00 PM. . .we get PRI on PBS. . .Tuesday. . .December 3, 1996. [Canadian Broadcasting Company/Corporation] [Public Radio International] [Public Broadcasting Service/System] We shall see/hear. Wired also called today, they now say we are in the February Wired which should go on the stands in early January. Around page 90. *** In response to last month's Newsletter, we have received a moderate amount of good wishes, and offers of several more computer sites on which to post these Project Gutenberg Etexts, and hopefully enough legal support to get us into a "Project Gutenberg, Inc." phase of existence, something I definintely have an approach/avoidance thing about. However, it seems that getting any actual financial assistance to keep a roof over the head of this particular computer, and its cousins, along with myself ... . .might be on the order of having a snowball fight in the nether regions. We received about enough money to keep us running for a week. Please put us on your Holiday gift list. . .information appended. If you have ANY hope of contacting ANYone at ANY institution that could be an eventual financial supporter, please let us know. The roof is paid for, this would only pay for the power, phone, taxes and other utilities. Once again we have managed to present 32 files we hope will be of interest to the general population. We have two more months scheduled for 32 per month-- then we hope to once again double our production, this time to 64 per month-- for each of the 12 months of 1997. While this may appear as an incredible amount of work, the truth is that your volunteers at Project Gutenberg have already spend several months doing books at the rate of 64 per month, during the Spring of 1996 just to insure that in 1997 we would be capable of accomplishing our goals. However, Etexts and copyright clearances are only barely coming in for the 32 Etexts per month scheduled for 1996, and usually we would be posting the ones for December right now, rather than for November, so unless we manage more of getting volunteers, or increasing their efficiency, we might have to send out only 32 books per month in 1997. . .maybe change our name to "The Book Of The Day Project." Michael Stern Hart Executive Director Project Gutenberg Here are the 32 Project Gutenberg Etexts for November, 1996. Mon Year Title and Author [# of PG books by the author][filename.ext] ### A "C" following the Etext number indicates a copyrighted work. Nov 1996 Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire by Gibbon V6 [6dfrexxx.xxx] 736 Nov 1996 Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire by Gibbon V5 [5dfrexxx.xxx] 735 Nov 1996 Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire by Gibbon V4 [4dfrexxx.xxx] 734 Nov 1996 Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire by Gibbon V3 [3dfrexxx.xxx] 733 Nov 1996 Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire by Gibbon V2 [2dfrexxx.xxx] 732 Nov 1996 Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire by Gibbon V1 [1dfrexxx.xxx] 731 Nov 1996 Oliver Twist, by Charles Dickens [Dickens #13] [olivrxxx.xxx] 730 Nov 1996 Hackers/Computer Revolution Heroes, by Steven Levy[hckrsxxx.xxx] 729C Nov 1996 Emile Zola, by William Dean Howells [howells #5] [ezolaxxx.xxx] 728 Nov 1996 The Star-Spangled Banner, by John Carpenter [stsbpxxx.xxx] 727 Nov 1996 Psychological Counter-Current by Howells [WDH #4] [pccmfxxx.xxx] 726 Nov 1996 Men of Invention and Industry by Samuel Smiles #2 [moiaixxx.xxx] 725 Nov 1996 The Man of Letters as a Man of Business [Howells3][tmlmbxxx.xxx] 724 Nov 1996 Henry James, Jr., by William Dean Howells [WDH#2][jimjrxxx.xxx] 723 Nov 1996 James Otis The Pre-Revolutionist, by J.C. Ridpath [jotisxxx.xxx] 722 Nov 1996 The Birds' Christmas Carol, Kate Douglas Wiggin #2[tbsccxxx.xxx] 721 Nov 1996 Almayer's Folly by Joseph Conrad [Conrad #12] [lmyerxxx.xxx] 720 Nov 1996 Plays of Wm.E. Henley and R.L. Stevenson [RLS #34][tpohsxxx.xxx] 719 Nov 1996 Tono Bungay, by H. G. Wells [H. G. Wells #6] [tonobxxx.xxx] 718 Nov 1996 Chita: A Memory of Last Island, by Lafcadio Hearn[chitaxxx.xxx] 717 Nov 1996 The Cruise of the Jasper B., by Don Marquis [#3] [jsprbxxx.xxx] 716 Nov 1996 Moon Endureth [Tales/Fancies], by John Buchan [#5][ndrthxxx.xxx] 715 Nov 1996 Bobbsey Twins in the Country, by Laura Lee Hope #1[tbticxxx.xxx] 714 Nov 1996 Memoirs of Popular Delusions V2, by Charles MacKay[2ppdlxxx.xxx] 713 Nov 1996 Thomas Jefferson, by Edward S. Ellis [tjeffxxx.xxx] 712 Nov 1996 Allan Quatermain, by H. Rider Haggard [HRH #1] [allnqxxx.xxx] 711 Nov 1996 Love of Life and other stories by Jack London [#4][llifexxx.xxx] 710 Nov 1996 The Princess and Curdie, by George MacDonald[GM#4][prcurxxx.xxx] 709 Nov 1996 The Princess and the Goblin, by George MacDonald 3[prgobxxx.xxx] 708 Nov 1996 Raffles, Further Adventures, by E.W. Hornung [#2] [raflsxxx.xxx] 707 Nov 1996 The Amateur Cracksman, by E.W. Hornung [Raffles#1][amatcxxx.xxx] 706 Nov 1996 The Roadmender, by Margt [Michael Fairless] Barber[rmendxxx.xxx] 705 Add ftp.info here. You can get the Project Gutenberg books via FTP and the Web: [This site is in Urbana, Illinois, and is quite fast] ftp uiarchive.cso.uiuc.edu or ftp 128.174.5.14 login: anonymous password: yourname@your.machine cd pub cd etext cd gutenberg cd etext95 [or 94, 93, 92, 91 or 90. 70's and 80's are in /etext90] get filename (be sure to set bin, if you get the .zip files) get more files quit get INDEX?00.GUT ? = 1,2,4,8 New files in etext96, of course. *** [This is usually the first site they appear in, but is slow] [This site is in Champaign, Illinois] ftp ftp.prairienet.org or ftp 192.17.3.4 username: anonymous password: yourlogin@your.machine.domain [this is your email address where you are] cd pub/providers/gutenberg/etext96 [etc, as above] ls or dir for a listing of files get filename.txt (ascii files) get filename.zip (binary zipped files) be sure to type "binary" before retrieving the .zip files! *** In Europe, please try our newest site at: Bucharest High School of Computer Science Serving Central and Eastern Europe ftp://ftp.lbi.ro/pub/Books/Gutenberg *** Also try: http://gutenberg.etext.org Project Gutenberg Web Sites can now be reached at: [This site is in Nevada] http://promo.net/pg/ [This is the definitive site for now] ftp://uiarchive.cso.uiuc.edu/pub/etext/gutenberg/pg_home.html http://www.prairienet.org/pg The Gutenberg archive can also be accessed from Singapore at http://www.sol.com.sg/pg and from Silicon Valley at ftp://cdrom.com/pub/gutenberg and ftp://archive.org/pub/gutenberg/etext/etext96 and etext95/94/93/92/91 and etext90, of course. and from Dallas, Texas at ftp://viemeister.com/pub/gutenberg Please let me know if you need more information. Michael S. Hart Project Gutenberg We need your donations desperately. Please send what you can to: Project Gutenberg P.O. Box 2782 Champaign, IL 61825-2782 [Check should be made out to "Project Gutenberg/BU"] Thanks! Happy Holidays!! Michael From: Subject: Re: humanities computing Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 188 (188) A group here is considering what a possible "graduate certificate in humanities computing" might entail, and are very interested to hear about courses actual or imagined which readers think might figure in such a program. The mainstay of our beginning conception is a course on markup, but we foresee possible courses on legal issues, pertinent history, and unix editing. If "humanities computing" is to be any sort of discipline--itself a debateable proposition, as has already been noted on this list--what is the subject matter? [Please post any replies to Humanist. It would be extremely useful to all of us if anyone associated with a graduate programme in humanities computing, or indeed contemplating a programme, would share his or her thoughts, curricula, or other kinds of information. While at Toronto I began an ftp'able, then gopher'd repository of materials, but this is quite old and has not been maintained for some time. I know that the Association for History and Computing, and various members thereof, have been working away on curricula for some time. Although these would be of great interest, "history and computing" is only one variety and has, for computing humanists as such, the wrong emphasis, or at least a rather old and outdated emphasis. Might there be an historical sequence in "computing and the humanities", "computing in the humanities", "humanities computing"? But I digress. Please send news of and thoughts on graduate programmes. --WM] From: Subject: Re: schloendorff's "man on horseback" Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 189 (189) I would be extremely grateful if anyone can tell me how to get hold of the film "Man on horseback", V. Schloendorff's English version of "Michael Kohlhaas - Rebell" (preferrably on video). I have also tried to get hold of "Mother Courage" (with Glenda Jackson), performed by the National Theatre London and apparently filmed by BBC London. Can anyone help? Thanks in advance! Christiane R. From: Subject: Re: 10.0486 programming: pragmatics, with a request Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 190 (190) [deleted quotation] FWIW, I *believe* the accepted spec is to enclose URLs in angle brackets. On the Mac, the popular InternetConfig extension (and its accompanying IceTe) will correctly interpret the brackets- I assume Eudora does as well. So the example becomes <http://www.maa.org/t_andl/>. The period doesn't matter as it falls outside the brackets. John _______________________________________________________________________ John Eckman Interdisciplinary Writing Program <http://weber.u.washington.edu/~eckman> Dept. of English; Box 35-4330 University of Washington Seattle, WA 91895 _______________________________________________________________________ From: Subject: esthetics? Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 191 (191) When it comes to aesthetics and the computer, there are more things there, Horatio, than one can imagine. I popped in my handy ComputerSelect CD-ROM, for example, and found that esthetics had only four hits; changing to aesthetics, however, led to more than forty. Few of them had to do with esthetics; most were on feeding ones prejudices as to platform, layout, look and feel, etc., and one was on having to give up C++ (did not live up to its promise, is clunky) in favor of JAVA. We need to break up our discussion into 1. the computer as esthetic object (I love the new curved keyboards; why don't we get rid of those ugly function keys, etc.; many of these are on ergonomics rather than esthetics). 2. The esthetics of the computer per se and the philosophy of bi-valued systems, bayesian probabilities, the whole nine yards. 3. The esthetics of the computer language one is fondest of, always better than the others; Marchandian BASIC just feels good, has a certain je ne sais quoi, etc. 4. The esthetics of the art object produced by the computer itself (I cannot stand sans-serif, it's so gauche; what an ugly screen; why don't they provide for more colors and better fonts?). 5. The esthetics of programming (I cannot abide go-to's, can you? C++ inhibits your creative instincts. 6. The esthetics of the program (BASIC, with all those numbers? Yech! Once you do one of those C++ things, even if you document (computerese for annotate) well, you can never read it again). I go back to the days before languages, even to the days when one had to slap switches, so I remember the good old days (of Eliza and the like) when esthetics in programming meant parsimony or at best elegance. If my program required less space than yours and did roughly the same thing, mine was better than yours. Then came the days in which one could get a program which would `pretty print' your program. If you wrote in BASIC, the indentation did not usually reflect your hierarchy (programs were and still are hierarchical). There was an insistence from some quarters on having all your declarations, even in BASIC, first in the program. There were a number of books and articles written on `programming style', mostly on avoiding go-to's and loops and being economical. When I program nowadays, and I do a good deal of it, all that is out the window. With the monsters we have nowadays, memory/storage presents no problem. If I need something to do something, I just steal a module from somewhere; I am even encouraged to do so. As Weizenbaum pointed out lo those many years ago, I half the time do not know what goes on in the black box of the module, but what the hey? No need to reinvent the wheel. Since I am using someone else's art object, I cannot be accused of bad esthetics. Programming nowadays in folk art. I just had an article published entitled: "The Computer in the Humanities -- Friend or Foe?" I am still not sure which it is, but I am committed. ! Jim Marchand. From: Subject: TUCOWS URGENT ANNOUNCEMENT Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 192 (192) [For your edification. By the way, if you do not know about TUCOWS, you should check it out, at <http://www.tucows.com> and many mirrors worldwide. -- WM] Over the last 3 weeks, TUCOWS has been inundated with hundreds of letters inquiring about rumors of conflict between TUCOWS Limited and Gateway 2000, Inc. In order to try and reduce the overwhelming amount of email we are getting on this subject, and stem the wild conjecture that is being thrown about the 'net, we are releasing full disclosure of the issue as it has evolved thus far. As it stands currently, Gateway has had very little official contact with TUCOWS. In fact, our only correspondance to date is the registered letter transcribed below. We sincerely wish that we could pass on further details at this point, however, we simply just don't have any further information in our possession at this time. Gateway has not commented further on the issue. For further information as it happens, please refer to http://www.tucows.com, or keep an eye on T-MILK, our internation TUCOWS newsletter. ---- Registered Mail From Gateway 2000, Inc. ---- October 22, 1996 CERTIFIED MAIL RETURN RECEIPT REQUESTED Scott Swedorski, President TUCOWS 5415 Dundas Street West Suite 301 Etobicoke, Ontario M9B 1B5 CANADA RE: Use of Holstein Cow by TUCOWS Dear Mr. Swedorski: It has come to our attention that your company is infringing on a valuable trademark of Gateway 2000, Inc. Specifically, we note that you are depicting Holstein cows on your web site to promote your company. Please be advised that Gateway 2000, Inc. owns the valid and subsisting federal Reg No. 1,725,231, marks consisting of a stylized design representing cow spots. This trademark and the Holstein cow are widely associated with Gateway 2000 and represent valuable goodwill and company assets. Gateway 2000, Inc. has promoted the Holstein cow and cow spots extensively to the consuming public and the trade, including the display of its cow spots trademark on boxes in which its products are shipped, which in 1995 amounted to almost 3.7 billion in sales. Your company's use of the Holstein cow and cow spots in connection with services relating to products of Gateway 2000 is likely to confuse and deceive the consuming public. We therefore call upon TUCOWS to cease all use of trademarks of Gateway 2000 immediately. Please contact us within ten (10) days of receipt of this letter with written assurances that TUCOWS has undertaken to cease its infringement of our registered trademarks. Absent a satisfactory response from you, we will take whatever legal action we deem appropriate without further notice to you. Sincerely, William M. Elliott Senior Vice President and General Counsel 610 Gateway Drive P.O. Box 2000 North Sioux City, South Dakota 57049-2000 Telephone 605-232-2000 Fax 605-232-2023 Toll Free 800-846-2000 From: Subject: esthetics Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 193 (193) I failed to mention that the word `intuitive' is often used for `(a)esthetically satisfying'. There are GUI freaks among us, who love to use icons and the like to enter their commands. I, on the other hand, am a Command Line Freak and like to boss the computer around. This religious difference is larger than that between those who are fond of various `platforms', e.g. DOS, WINDOWS, MAC, PC, UNIX, etc. All my GUI friends assure me that the use of a rodent with attendant mouse elbow is `intuitive', whereas use of words is not, not to mention the use of function keys, sometimes labeled as cavemannish. `Look and feel', `intuitive', `ergonomically satisfying', `elegant' are all used for `aesthetically pleasing'. I forgot also to mention `structural programming', `up/down programming' and all the others. Since aesthetics, whatever it is, is important to human beings, those involved in the man-machine dialogue ought to think about it. Jim Marchand. From: Subject: Re: 10.0496 humanities computing graduate programmes? Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 194 (194) [I pass along the following message although the userid is less than informative and the message itself seems to have lost its signature. Would the sender please identify him- or herself? It looks as if the Internet provider in question has a less than fail-proof menu system... --WM] [deleted quotation] Coming from the commercial world, I approach this question from what is perhaps an academically unorthodox point of view -- first consider real world issues, then determine if and how humanities computing can fulfill a need, and finally craft / develop a course. My conclusion is that Humanities Computing may be part of the solution to one of the most pervasive problems our society faces, e.g. boredom / apathy / lack of success in the classroom. There are approximately 5 million computers installed in K-12 schools in the United States alone. By and large, these machines are used as expensive typewriters -- their potential as "teaching technology" has not yet been reached. Is it possible that searchable electronic texts, multi-media materials, the internet, etc. can be combined with a pedagogical approach that: * More effectively engages the attention of the student ... * Shows students how to construct and pursue discovery strategies of their own design ... * Imparts both knowledge and skills that are useful in life and career ... Before going further along this avenue, might I ask whether this line of thinking merits further discussion, is of interest to other members of the list, etc.? Best, From: Subject: T. Carlyle Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 195 (195) I need to find out how many times the word "Fact" is used in Carlyle's life of Fredrick II. Can anyone recommend an archive, or do a quick search. Thanks. K.Soheil@kcl.ac.uk From: Subject: Re: 10.0435 Juvenal in Ren. humanists? Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 196 (196) SALVE! I would like to thank my fellow humanists who responded to my inquiry; every response has helped the research process move inexorably forward! I will email a copy of the finished paper to all those who contributed when the project is finished in a few weeks (hopefully!) AVE ET PAX VOBISCUM Mark Gardner From: Ed Hackett, NSF Subject: New NSF Interdisciplinary Program Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 197 (197) To: Members of the Science and Technology Studies Community ***NEW NSF PROGRAM IN LEARNING AND INTELLIGENT SYSTEMS*** There is a new NSF initiative in learning and intelligent systems: understanding and enhancing the ability to learn and create. It is a foundation-wide initiative to fund interdisciplinary, collaborative research on that topic, particularly research that would not be funded by any existing program. Basically, the research must span large areas of science--biology and computing, for example--so as to fall outside the scope of a single NSF directorate. Unfortunately, the deadlines on proposals are close. The program announcement may be found at: www.nsf.gov/lis. via George Gale/ www.umkc.edu/sci-stud. From: Subject: greetings Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 198 (198) ______________________________________________________________________________ ___ _ __ _____ _____ __ _ ___ ___ _ __ ___ _ ___ _ ___ _ __ ___ || | //\ || | || | || | // \ || | //\ ||\ | || | || / //\ || | ||--| ||--| ||--/ ||--/ \\/ || ||--| ||--| || \| || | ||/ ||--| ||--| ||~~| ||~~| ||~~ ||~~ // || ||~~| ||~~| || | ||__| ||\ ||~~| ||~~| || | || | || || || \\_/ || | || | || | \_/ || \ || | || | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ \ ' / - (\ / (\ (\ (\ (\ / | ) - (\ (\ (\ (\ | ) | ) | ) | ) `| | ) | ) | ) | ) `| `| `| `| |~| `| `| `| |~| |~| |~| |~| | | |~| |~| |~| |~| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | \~~~/ | | | | | | | | \~~~/ \~~~/ \~~~/ \~~~/ (_) \~~~/ \~~~/ \~~~/ \~~~/ (_) (_) (_) (_)_____(_)_____(_) (_) (_) (_) (_) (_) (_) \======(_)======/ (_) (_) (_) (_) (_) (_)_____________(_)_____________(_) (_) (_) (_) (_) \==============(_)==============/ (_) (_) (_) (_)_____________________(_)_____________________(_) (_) (_) \======================(_)======================/ (_) (_)_____________________________(_)_____________________________(_) \==============================(_)==============================/ __(_)__ __(=======)__ (=============) ______________________________________________________________________________ \ ____ ,_ _ _ _ __ __ _ _ ____ __ ____ / \ | | /_| |/_/ , | __| | __\ | | ,\ | | / \ / \----------------------------------------------------------------/ | ___ _|_____________________|_ | | _ _ ,------|,,,|------,| | C H A N U K A H | || | ( \___/^\___/ ) |_ ========= | \_/~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~\_/ | | |-------------| |\| 8 o o 8 | | | ||,\ ,-,-,_,-|| |~ 8\ /8 | ,*, , , , _ , , , , | | |||_||_|_|_|_|| | __|||||__ |/~/_U_U_U_U_|_U_U_U_U_ | | || _ _,-,_,-|| | / \\|// \ (@} \_\_\_\_|_/_/_/_/ | | || |=|-|=|-|=|| | / / \ \/ / |_\_\|/_/_| | | ||_|_|_|_|_|_|| | / /_ : |\__/ |\|/| | | ||-,_,-,,-, || | \___} : | | \|/ | | ||=|=|=||=|_ || | \____:____/ | | | | ||_|_|_||_|\\|| | //| | |\\ | /|\ | | |~~~~~~~~~~~~~| | ""| | |"" | |/|\| | / |/~~~~~~~~~~~\|--|----| | |----|---------/|/|\|\-----------\ / \__/ \__/ _| _|_ |_ \ / (__| |__) _ |_ \ / _|_ / \ ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ /|/|/|/|/|/|/|/|/|/|/|/|/|/|/|/|/|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\ ============================================================================= ...____. ,___. ( / ) / / / / __. /_ __. _ / o ./__,(_/|_/ /_(_/|_\/ \/ / Dr. Tzvee Zahavy Internet email: zahavy@andromeda.rutgers.edu http://newark.rutgers.edu/~zahavy/tzvee.html From: Subject: Re: 10.0496 humanities computing graduate Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 199 (199) Hello, I wonder why everybody is persistently trying to view the positive side of humanities computing, ignoring or depreciating the negative side effects such endeavour might entail. For instance, MOO technology which is used in some Universities to create virtual worlds where one is encouraged to let one's fantasy go unrestraintedly in full fledge has turned out to be an an adverse instrument for pupils' performances. Many youngsters neglect their lessons because they spend endless long hours at the Telnet site. Since this resource is particularly directed to children or teenagers -because of its very nature: I doubt that adults would be willing to engage in such a naive entertainment- the amount and quality of damage this can cause to our next generation is unpredictable. (Some Universities have forbidden its use). Please do not misunderstand me. I am not asserting that humanities computing should be dispensed with altogether, or anything of the sort. I am merely laying emphasis on the fact that we should consider its pros and cons. Most especially nowadays where Postmodernist concept of "creativity" has gained the upper hand. I would say that the pomo movement repels anything that has to do with rigour. To their minds, "rigour" stands for "enemy of creativity". An astonishing contention. Famous counterexamples of both extreme rigour and startling creativity immediately burst into mind: Leonardo da Vinci, Aristotle, Sir Isaac Newton, Leibnitz, Beethoven, Einstein, Rembrandt, Michelangelo, Faraday, Medelejeff, JS Bach, and so on. To delve into the depths of an inkling that might shed light on this strange phenomenon at the end of the second millennium exceeds the purposes set out for this posting. To make matters worse, the pomo movement views anything remotely resembling any of those qualities that we, the representatives of the sixties, enhanced as a valuable badge, as attacks to their basic doctrine: that of boundless creativity. The word "creativity" is in fact rather ambiguous: for to be creative may mean merely using one's imagination, devoid of any positive connotations. The way now is used and abused, arbitrarily stands for "imaginative cleverness in making or designing". Thanks for your attention, JC Garelli In a message 5 Dec 96 at 21:18, a propos of 10.0498 humanities computing viewed, Nelson Hilton says: [deleted quotation] Undoubtedly, yes, it is of my interest, at least. I think its importance cannot possibly overemphasized. Juan Carlos Garelli, MD, PhD Attachment Resarch Center Department of Early Development Mailto:garelli@attach.edu.ar From: Subject: a notable online publication Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 200 (200) In these incunabular days of e-publishing, I keep a list of anything on the Web that strikes me as significant, even when I don't quite know what it may signify. I could call these items curiosities, but that appellation might seem dismissive, and I don't mean it to be. Perhaps when we know enough, we can begin to dismiss things with impunity. In any case, I submit for your consideration the "Salt made the world go round" homepage, at <http://www.geocities.com/~salt/> It seems to me that for us observers of online activity, the mere fact that such a thing could exist so easily is the significant fact. How wonderful, especially for us old salts of the e-world (that had to come out, sorry). Allow me to suggest that you might send the URLs of your own "notable online publications" to Humanist whenever you see one. WM ------------------------------------------------ Dr. Willard McCarty, Senior Lecturer King's College London / Strand / London WC2R 2LS +44 0171 873-2784 / Willard.McCarty@kcl.ac.uk http://www.kcl.ac.uk/kis/schools/hums/ruhc/wlm/ From: Subject: A new Fawcett Library : a request for support Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 201 (201) The FAWCETT LIBRARY Some members of the Humanist circle may be aware of=20 the Fawcett Libary. The Fawcett, as it is often=20 referred to, is the National Research Library for=20 Women's history. It is the oldest and most=20 comprehensive libary on all aspects of women in=20 society in the UK and is also regarded as one of the=20 best of its kind in the world. The Library is=20 primarily a research collection and includes=20 collections on feminism, work, education, health, the=20 family, law, arts, science, language, sexuality,=20 fashion and the home. The emphasis is on Britain, but=20 there are good collections from the Commonwealth and=20 the Third World and an increasing US section. =20 The Library includes the Josephine Butler Collection on=20 prostitution, sexuality and related topics, the Cavendish Bentick collection of old and rare items, over 60,000 books=20 and pamphlets, many of them first editions, dating back to=20 1600,a large audio visual collection and a fine collection=20 of suffragette banners and memorabilia, including the=20 personal effects of Emily Davidson who died for the cause=20 of women's suffrage in the famous Derby Day protest of=20 1913. =20 The Fawcett Library was established in 1926 as the Library of the London Society for Women^=D2s Service(formerly=20 Suffrage), a non-militant organisation led by Dame=20 Millicent Fawcett. In 1953 the Society was renamed=20 after her and the library became the Fawcett Library. In 1977 it was moved to its present location at =20 London Guildhall University, one of the new=20 universities in the UK, where it remains.=20 It has been an ambition of the University to develop a=20 proper home for the Library. At present, it is=20 located in a well-equipped basement with room for=20 around 15 readers and a range of appropriate facilities. =20 Nevertheless, there is little room for expansion or=20 development and no facilities for presentation and display.=20 An opportunity has now arisen to transform the=20 Library. The University has acquired an old=20 Public Washhouse, dating to the mid-19th century, with a=20 complete facade. It adjoins the main humanities and social=20 science departments and is located within a few yards of=20 Aldgate East underground station and very near to the=20 mainline Liverpool Street Station. =20 It is proposed to construct a purpose built library,=20 with 45 research places, a comprehensive range of=20 facilties for conservation and repair, an exhibition=20 gallery, seminar and conference space, an educational=20 project area and a shop and cafe. This will be an=20 imaginative building, incorporating the facade of the=20 washouse, and is has been designed by Clare Wright, a=20 celebrated architect in the UK. This will make it one of=20 the finest libraries of its kind anywhere in the world. We will be raising 5.2 million for this purpose and a=20 fundraising team has been formed with the Speaker of=20 the House of Commons, Betty Boothroyd, as patron.=20 The purpose of this message however is to solicit=20 support for our application to the Heritage Lottery=20 Board.=20 Quite simply, I am asking Humanist members to email me=20 their support for the principle of this project so=20 that it can be included in the section of our=20 application relating to "public support". This is=20 pretty crucial because however good the project, there=20 must be public support for it to gain financial grant=20 from the Lottery. =20 If you are prepared to support us, simply email me on=20 hopkin@lgu.ac.uk If you want to know more, contact the Library on=20 0171 320 1189 international (+44)71 320 1189 =20 or fax 0171 320 1188 Many thanks for your help ********************************* Deian R Hopkin Vice Provost London Guildhall University 31 Jewry Street London EC3N 2EY Tel 0171 320 1129 fax 0171 320 3018 hopkin@lgu.ac.uk From: Subject: fwd:Bad Writing Contest Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 202 (202) [deleted quotation] FORWARD END -------------------------- ---------- Internet: c.koellerer@magnet.at FIDO: 2:315/3.22 Fax: ++43 662 420236 (24h) From: Subject: New additions to the American Verse Project Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 203 (203) The Humanities Text Initiative is pleased to announce the addition of 13 new texts to the American Verse Project. Works by significant African-American authors not contained in other electronic text collections have been added, including: Magnolia leaves / Mary Weston Fordham Dreams of life : miscellaneous poems / Timothy Thomas Fortune Dis, dat an' tutter : poems / Elliot Blaine Henderson Soliloquy of Satan and other poems / Elliott Blaine Henderson Ethiope lays / Priscilla Jane Thompson Gleanings of quiet hours / Priscilla Jane Thompson Other works added include: Poems. Volume I & II / H.F. Gould Idyl of work / Lucy Larcom Anarchiad : a New England poem, 1786-1787 / Humphreys, Barlow, Trumbull and Hopkins Miriam : a dramatic poem / Louisa Jane Hall Nineveh and other poems / George Sylvester Viereck Spell of the Yukon and Other Verses / Robert William Service (contributed to American Verse Project by Alan Light; encoded by HTI) The HyperBibliography of American Poetry now contains more than 1000 entries; ca. 500 major updates and revisions are to be included next semester. Christina Powell Humanities Text Intiative http://www.hti.umich.edu From: John Unsworth Subject: Re: 10.0504 dark side of humanities computing? Date: Sun, 8 Dec 1996 22:37:17 -0500 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 204 (204) [deleted quotation] This criticism is, obviously, blissfully uninformed by experience with educational uses of MOOs and MUDs. MOOs do have the capacity to enthrall students, but that capacity can be used for good *or* ill, depending on the imagination, creativity, and discipline of the instructor. [deleted quotation] I know of no one except the author of this post who opposes rigor and creativity. Examples of rigor in postmodernism might burst into mind as well, if the author of this post had read any. Forgive the tone, but both of these criticisms are intellectually irresponsible. John Unsworth / Director, IATH / Dept. of English ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ http://jefferson.village.virginia.edu/~jmu2m/ From: Sharon Cogdill Subject: Re: 10.0504 dark side of humanities computing? Date: Sun, 08 Dec 1996 19:25:02 -0600 (CST) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 205 (205) Among other things, JC Garelli wrote, [deleted quotation] well, um, actually, people working in the field of, to pick one example, computers and writing/rhetoric have been working for more than a decade to think clearly about the semiotics of computer interfaces, the values inherent in the language and processes of computing, and the impact of computers and word processing on writing and on classroom practice. The large number of studies that tried for ten years to find out *if* students wrote better on computers than with pen and paper all attest to attempts not to view computers positively *or* negatively a priori, but to test our hypotheses. I can help you construct a bibliography on this, if you like, but the bibliographic overview of an established discipline like computers and writing would get you quite a long list of things to read. More instructive, perhaps, would be for you to see for yourself just how much work has been done. There's lots of stuff that *is* uncritical, of course, but lots and lots that's not. [deleted quotation] Well, as somebody who uses MOO technology with adults in educational settings, and have done so now for several years, I need to address the members of this list about what seem to me to be misconceptions and unsubstantiated claims made in Mr Garelli's posting. Like many other responsible faculty in literature and writing classes, I use MOOs to turn the discussions in some of my classes from oral activities to meetings in which we all *write* to each other, in real time, about what we think and have thought about the subject for the day. Some work has been done on MOOing (or, more precisely, MUDding) in education. The online journals _Computer-Mediated Communication_ and _Kairos_, for example, have both published articles about the use of synchronous communication software in classes. The number of conference papers presented about MOOing and MUDding increases every year. I have published in _Kairos_ on the community of computers and writing teachers who get together most Tuesday nights (on a MOO in the Media Lab at MIT) to talk about the use of computers in our classes. That is, we all telnet to MIT's computer from our own servers; most of us are from the U.S., but there are also members of the group from Australia, England, and Norway. We telnet to MIT, and then we talk about/write about issues in computers and writing. This regular Tuesday meeting is part of the Netoric Project, codirected by Tari Fanderclai and Greg Siering. (I don't have the urls here at home, so I'll suggest you begin looking at Tari's homepage - <http://ucet.ufl.edu/~tari>, and she's got links to spots that can give you more information about the Netoric Project and MUDding in education as well. I'm sure that other subscribers to Humanist also have experience, including publishing history, with MUDs, but if any of you would like to know more, please let me know and I'll be happy to construct a small list of urls, telnet addresses, and articles and email you back or post it to Humanist if there's enough interest.) (For those of you who may not have seen it yet, "MOO" is a technical acronym for something like Multi-user Object-Oriented, the last which describes a kind of programming language, of course, and the first which hints at the origins of MOO software, a certain kind of role-playing gaming software called MUD.) MUD software is communications software; email and listserv are *a*synchronous communication; MUDding (and MOOing) is synchronous - real time. While it certainly can be used for dungeons-and-dragons-type games, MUD software can also be used to facilitate real-time *written* discussion among a number of people at the same time. When a writer in a MUD finishes writing a thought and hits Return, the software sends it out to everybody else in the same "room" in the MUD. Those people then read the statement as soon as it is written and can respond to it immediately, or think about it, or ignore it and write something of their own. Many of my students find MUDding to be liberating in a classroom. Students who do not have good literacy skills - or at least literacy skills comparable to those of the rest of the class - will be silenced by MUDding, but many students who are uncomfortable speaking in class find themselves very active in a CMC classroom. Women tell me that they never worry about interrupting anyone and how much freer they feel to speak for that reason; students who are accustomed to dominating a classroom find themselves on a more level playing field. Those of us who use MUDs in class really do not prefer that our students "let [their] fantasy go unrestrainedly in full fledge," though I'd suggest that the line between fun and education may be less clear than it sometimes seems. In fact, I like my MUDding students to be thoughtful and deliberate and creative and rigorous and all those things I expect them to be in class when they address an idea orally or in a quiz. MUDs can be particularly useful when a teacher would like to make the classroom discussion a *text* in the class - that's exactly what MUD does. Students can see very clearly how a particular rhetorical strategy can have effects they did or did not intend; they can learn to distinguish intention from effect; they can see evidence and associations as material things - words on a screen or page - and not abstract things that disappear when the sound dies away. Language itself becomes something they can look at, analyze, remember (more or less) calmly, and evaluate, as can argumentation, evidence, analysis itself, and so on. Beyond mere classroom dialogue, though, MUD software can help us get at the ways in which our verbal environments become a part of our discourse, and sometimes, if we're lucky and things are very clear, we might begin to get glimmerings about the cause-and-effect relations between environment as it is verbally constructed and the discourse we use to live by. (If there are such clear-cut cause-and-effect relations; I'm still thinking about that one.) Also, I'm aware of some MOOs where faculty teaching French and Spanish to native speakers of English; and a graduate student working with me is using MOO in her English as a Second Language class. Not for fantasy and role playing, but to help the students work on their writing, their spontaneous language, and the construction of a linguistic community for them to belong to as they work on their language skills. A faculty member in German here and I have been talking about setting up a space where students working on German can meet to talk with/write with other learners of German or other speakers of German. Writing centers across the United States use MOO software to enable students to "visit" the writing center virtually. One such space, at the University of Missouri, has it set up so that the meeting (synchronous communication, MUDding) occurs in one window, the paper being discussed shows up in another, and a hypertext writing-center help sheet can show up in another. I think I won't pick at the rest of Mr Garelli's statements; my arguments and descriptions will have to stand on their own. Comments, anyone? Sharon Cogdill English Department, St. Cloud State University St. Cloud, Minnesota, U.S.A. scogdill@tigger.scloud.msus.edu http://condor.stcloud.msus.edu/~scogdill From: "Randall L. Jones" Subject: Walter & Sally Sedlow? Date: Mon, 9 Dec 1996 10:43:57 -0500 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 206 (206) I received a phone call from someone today who is trying to make contact with Walter and Sally Sedlow. I remember that they used to come regularly to meetings having to do with humanities and computing, but I have not seen them for a long time. If anyone knows anything about would they please send me a message? Thanks. Randall Jones From: BOES HENRIK L Subject: Religion and Internet Technology Date: Mon, 9 Dec 1996 10:43:33 -0500 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 207 (207) Greetings y'all! I am looking for information on courses, programs, texts (online and printed) dealing with the study of religion in the Internet age. I know there's quite a bit oiut there, but don't have time to do a lot of browsing/researching at the moment: I need the info for an ad hoc faculty meeting Tuesday. Any information you might have would be helpful, I'm sure. Thanks! Henrik Boes Dept. of Religious Studies University of Colorado at Boulder From: WILLARD MCCARTY Subject: prosopography? Date: Mon, 9 Dec 1996 18:53:14 +0000 (GMT) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 208 (208) On behalf of colleagues here at King's I'd like to gather up news about any current (and computer-using) prosopography projects. Please send references and contact information to me. Thanks. Yours, WM From: Subject: CAAH Digest - 6 Dec 1996 to 7 Dec 1996 Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 209 (209) [Forwarded from the CONSORTIUM OF ART AND ARCHITECTURAL HISTORIANS , Kelly Woestman , originally from James B. Schick _History Computer>Review_ (xpost H-Survey)] [deleted quotation]__________________________________ Pamela Cohen Center for Electronic Texts in the Humanities 169 College Avenue, New Brunswick NJ 08903 phone: (908) 932-1384 / fax: (908) 932-1386 http://www.ceth.rutgers.edu pac@rci.rutgers.edu From: Subject: Prosopographical Projects Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 210 (210) In response to your posting about current prosopographical projects, let me mention a project that NEH funded in 1992, in case it is not in your list. Professor Ralph Mathisen of the History Department at the University of South Carolina (Columbia, SC) received a grant to prepare a prosopographical database based upon the _Corpus Incriptionun Latinarum_. It covers some 12,000 individuals who lived in the Mediterranean world from 260 CE to 640 CE. Best wishes for the holidays. Helen Aguera National Endowment for the Humanities From: Subject: Re: 10.0504 dark side of humanities computing? Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 211 (211) One of our correspondents wrote: [deleted quotation]Good. [...but in what sense? --WM] From: dennism@quasar.ispace.com (Dennis Merritt) Subject: Basque translators Date: Thu, 05 Dec 1996 11:26:21 EST X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 212 (212) The Language Bank, Inc. is looking for qualified translators and interpreters to work with our company on a part time basis. Please forward this information to those interested in a part time money making oportunity. Thank You, Dennis Merritt - --- To learn more about The Language Bank, Inc. we cordially invite you to visit us at: http://www.language-bank.com/ !!! or call us toll-free at: 1-888-TLB-1444 From: Ellen Leenarts Subject: Re: 10.0509 Sedlows? religion & Internet? prosopography? Date: Tue, 10 Dec 1996 10:39:26 +0100 (MET) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 213 (213) There are many pages on Shia Islam, two pages to start with are: http://www-leland.staford.edu/~yusufali/islam/index.html http://www.icon-stl.net/~shia Greetings, Ellen Leenarts (Leenarts@Rullet.LeidenUniv.nl) Dept. of History Leiden University The Netherlands From: "Robert M. Fowler" Subject: Religion and Internet Technology Date: Tue, 10 Dec 1996 00:34:48 -0500 (EST) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 214 (214) The very best thing at the moment is the new Scholars Press book by Patrick Durusau, _High Places in Cyberspace: A Guide to Biblical and Religious Studies, Classics, and Archaeological Resources on the Internet_. The printed book will be kept up to date at the accompanying web site, <http://scholar.cc.emory.edu/scripts/highplaces.html>. *************************************************************** * Robert M. Fowler * * Professor and Chairperson, Department of Religion * * Baldwin-Wallace College, 275 Eastland Road, Berea, OH 44017 * * rfowler@baldwinw.edu http://www2.baldwinw.edu/~rfowler * * 216-826-2173 (office) 216-826-3264 (fax) * * NOTE NEW AREA CODE (440) EFFECTIVE JULY 1997 * *************************************************************** From: Subject: Project Gutenberg #750 Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 215 (215) As has been the case for several years now, I try to publish something of particular interest on the anniversary of the death of my father. I have received permission to dedicate Project Gutenberg Etext #750 to Professory H. H. Hart, today, December 10, 1996 on the 7th anniversary of his death. He was instrumental in bringing Project Gutenberg to an even wider audience than I could have. Thanks Dad! The High History of the Holy Graal is for you. . . . Michael *** Mon Year Title and Author [# of PG books by the author][filename.ext] ### A "C" following the Etext number indicates a copyrighted work. Dec 1996 The High History of the Holy Graal, Author Unknown[hhohgxxx.xxx] 750 Dec 1996 Barlaam and Ioasaph, by St. John of Damascus [bioasxxx.xxx] 749 Dec 1996 The Brother of Daphne, by Dornford Yates [bdaphxxx.xxx] 748 Dec 1996 Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine, Gould/Pyle [aacomxxx.xxx] 747 Dec 1996 Burning Daylight, by Jack London [Jack London #5] [bdlitxxx.xxx] 746 Dec 1996 One Divided by Pi, To A Million Digits [math #17] [onepixxx.xxx] 745 Dec 1996 The Golden Mean, To A Million Digits [math #16] [gmeanxxx.xxx] 744 Dec 1996 Thoughts on Man, His Nature, etc, by Wm Godwin [tmnwgxxx.xxx] 743 Dec 1996 Editorials from the Hearst Newspapers by Brisbane [ehnabxxx.xxx] 742 Dec 1996 Thomas Hart Benton's Remarks to the Senate THB#1] [thbrsxxx.xxx] 741 Dec 1996 John C. Calhoun's Remarks in the Senate[Calhoun1#][jccrsxxx.xxx] 740 Dec 1996 Henry Clay's Remarks in House and Senate [Clay #1][hcrhsxxx.xxx] 739 Dec 1996 The Puzzle of Dickens's Last Plot by Andrew Lang#5[pldlpxxx.xxx] 738 Dec 1996 The Bobbsey Twins at School, by Laura Lee Hope #2?[tbtasxxx.xxx] 737 From: Subject: Re: text analysis program Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 216 (216) [The following from DARWIN-L, recommending Perl for text-analysis applications, with a list of useful sources. --WM] I recommend that you use the Perl scripting language because of its "simplicity" in comparison with other languages. Accordingly, I have listed the essential sites and cites for you below: (1) Mac internet software http://www.msilink.com/~browning/index.html (2) MacPerl http://w4.lns.cornell.edu/~pvhp/perl/nixnix.html (3) Word counting program "Teach Yourself Perl in 21 Days (First Edition)" one of the few accessible books for newbies NOT brutally criticized by Perl (UNIX) gurus who (usually) love only the O'Reilly books on Perl (see http://www.perl.org/). In "Teach Yourself...", see "Day 5", page 160 "Splitting a Sting into a list" for a simple word counting program and see "Day 6", page 198 "Using Command-Line Arguments as Values" for a word search and counting program (for "counting by type"). Please note that the page numbers and "chapters" that I have given you are from the first edition; the second edition on Perl5 is currently being sold in book stores and may or may not have the same pagination. (4) Parts of speech program This is not simple (i.e., few will take the time to write this program for you) and you probably want to put your question to a more specialized list (where someone has already written it and will share it with you). For this you can write to: Subscription Address: almanac@ruby.oce.orst.edu - comp.lang.perl Submission Address: PERL-USERS@ruby.oce.orst.edu Dan Gold, Brain Link Inc., brainlink@huskynet.com ================ At 09:42 AM 12/10/96 -0500, witkowski wrote: [deleted quotation] From: Subject: Conference Announcement: please post Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 217 (217) ****************************** DRH97 CONFERENCE ANNOUNCEMENT ****************************** D R H '97 St Annes College Oxford 14-17 September 1997 http://users.ox.ac.uk/~drh97 Bringing together the creators, users, distributors, and custodians of Digital Resources in the Humanities. Mission: DRH97 aims to become a new forum for all those affected by the digitization of our common cultural heritage: the scholar producing or using an electronic edition; the teacher using digital media in the seminar room; the publisher finding new ways to reach new markets; the librarian, curator, art historian, or archivist wishing to improve both access to and conservation of the digital information that characterizes contemporary culture and scholarship. Format : The conference will take up three intensive days of academic papers, panel discussions, technical reports, and software demonstrations, held this year in a comfortable Oxford college. The atmosphere will, we hope, encourage a lot of energetic discussion, both formal and informal. Leading practitioners of the application of digital techniques and resources in the Humanities, from the worlds of scholarship, librarianship, and publishing will be there, exchanging expertise, experience, and opinions. Sponsors: The conference is sponsored by the British Library, the Office for Humanities Communication, the Arts and Humanities Data Service, the Centre for Computing in the Humanities of Kings College London, the International Institute for Electronic Library Research of de Montfort University, the Library of University College London, and the Humanities Computing Unit of Oxford University. Timetable: Proposals are invited for academic papers, themed panel sessions and reports of work in progress. Extended abstracts (1500 to two thousand words) should be submitted by April 7th 1997. All proposals will be reviewed by an independent panel. Full versions (2 to 4 thousand words) of accepted papers will be required by July 7th 1997 for inclusion in the conference proceedings. Themes: creation of digital resources, textual, visual, and time-based; integration of digital resources as multimedia; policies and strategies for electronic delivery, both commercial and non-commercial; cataloguing and metadata aspects of resource discovery; pedagogic implications of digital resources and electronic delivery; encoding standards; intellectual property rights; funding, cost-recovery, and charging mechanisms; digitization techniques and problems. Cost and accommodation: We hope to hold the conference fee at last year's level (225 pounds, covering lunches, dinners, and the whole academic programme). For accommodation, delegates can choose between ensuite rooms at 45 pounds/day or study/bedrooms with shared bathroom at 30 pounds/day for B & B. All accommodation is on campus in modern purpose-built blocks adjoining the quadrangle and within a few minutes walk of all conference facilities. The conference banquet will cost an additional 40 pounds. Further information: The conference web site at http://users.ox.ac.uk/~drh97 will be regularly updated, and will include full details of the procedure for submitting proposals, the programme, and registration information. Bookmark it now! From: jr19 Subject: Proceedings: Biological Nomenclature in 21st Century Date: Mon, 2 Dec 1996 14:22:00 EST X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 218 (218) [I pass the following along from the excellent DARWIN-L primarily because of the action taken by the Univ. of Maryland, described below. If anyone knows more about Maryland's new policy, I am sure Humanists would like to know as well. --WM] Proceedings of A Mini-Symposium on BIOLOGICAL NOMENCLATURE IN THE 21st CENTURY http://www.life.umd.edu/bees/96sym.html Edited by James L. Reveal We are pleased to announce the above electronic publication. Introduction In the fall of 1995 the University of Maryland adopted a policy on electronic publications, treating them as equivalent to printed matter. This, coupled with the importance of the subject, combined to produce these Proceedings (http://www.life.umd.edu/bees/96sym.html) of a mini-symposium on biological nomenclature in the 21st century held at the University of Maryland on 4 November 1996 under the sponsorship of the BEES faculty and the College of Life Sciences (http://www.life.umd.edu/). With the assistance of seminar coordinators, Dr. Kenneth P. Sebens and Dr. Charles B. Fenster, I was permitted to invite Dr. Dan H. Nicolson, Dr. John McNeill, Dr. Richard K. Brummitt and Dr. Kevin de Queiroz to examine the importance of codes of scientific nomenclature in the 21st century. In September, abstracts of the four invited speakers were published electronically and requests were made for commentaries. Prompt publication was made possible by the timely submission of contributions from the four speakers and three individuals who sent commentaries. To the numerous biologists who took time to review each of the manuscripts rapidly, and each of the contributors who responded to the reviewer's remarks promptly - all done electronically - I am most grateful. This is particularly noteworthy because the usual payment for such labor, a copy of the final published work, is not the same in this case. The future of archieving electronic publications is uncertain. Therefore, individuals are encouraged to make hardcopies of each paper and place them in libraries for future reference. Furthermore, an electronic version is being archived by the University of Maryland, and others wishing to do so are herein granted permission. With the formal publication of the Proceedings, others wishing to present comments are urge to do so through TAXACOM. The effort has been a learning exercise. The product is not entirely satisfactory, but the task has been interesting and the technology is improving rapidly. The future of the electronic world, like nomenclature in the next century, will be intriguing even if it all seems uncertain. The included papers: *Introduction ---Opening Remarks by James L. Reveal ---Original Abstracts *Chapters ---Chapter 1. Animal, Vegetable or Mineral? by Dan H. Nicolson ---Chapter 2. The BioCode: Integrated biological nomenclature in the 21st century? by John McNeill ---Chapter 3. Quite Happy with the Present Code, Thank You by R. K. Brummitt ---Chapter 4. A Phylogenetic Approach to Biological Nomenclature as an Alternative to the Linnaean Systems in Current Use by Kevin de Queiroz *Chapter 5. Commentaries: -----Commentary 1. Biological Nomenclature by Piero Delprete -----Commentary 2. Biological Nomenclature by David Frodin -----Commentary 3. Two Codes in a Dual System? No Thanks by Gea Zijlstra ---Chapter 6. Solutions for Biological Nomenclature by James L. Reveal Papers presented here should be cited in the following manner: de Queiroz, K. 1996. "A phylogenetic approach to biological nomenclature as an alternative to the Linnean systems in current use." In: J.L. Reveal, ed. Proceedings of a mini- symposium on biological nomenclature in the 21st century. University of Maryland: www.life.umd.edu/bees/96sym.html. James L. Reveal Department of Plant Biology, University of Maryland, College Park, Maryland 20742-5815, U.S.A. 2 December 1996 jr19@umail.umd.edu From: Willard McCarty Subject: an online lexicon of the humanities Date: Wed, 11 Dec 1996 08:29:20 +0000 () X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 219 (219) Humanists will likely appreciate knowing about a site attached to the homepage of the Summer Institute of Linguistics (www.sil.org), itself worthy of attention. This is "In Other Words: A Lexicon of the Humanities", <http://www.sil.org/humanities/>, which at the moment contains material for Literary Criticism, Rhetoric, Linguistics, and something called Identity Politics. The aim is "to provide a way for scholars to cross over from one discipline to another in their studies". Contributions are solicited. WM ------------------------------------------------ Dr. Willard McCarty, Senior Lecturer King's College London / Strand / London WC2R 2LS +44 0171 873-2784 / Willard.McCarty@kcl.ac.uk http://www.kcl.ac.uk/kis/schools/hums/ruhc/wlm/ From: Omar Subject: Re: 10.0513 dark is good Date: Tue, 10 Dec 1996 16:41:29 -0500 (EST) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 220 (220) On Tue, 10 Dec 1996, WILLARD MCCARTY wrote: [deleted quotation] Not entirely off the subject, but close: For anyone who would like to see a great example of the interesting social phenomena that occur on (the more mature and society-based) MOOs, I highly recommend the essay "A Rape in Cyberspace" by Julian Dibbell. The essay is printed in _Flame_Wars:_the_Discourse_of_Cyberculture_ (Mark Dery, Ed. Duke UP) and discusses a socio-political revolution that occurred on a MOO the author frequented at the time. It's well written and enjoyable. In fact, I'd recommend the whole book. -john drummond http://falcon.jmu.edu/~drummojg/ 'on the thin side of evil and trying not to break through' --Toni Morrison From: Subject: HUMANIST 10.509 - Prosopography Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 221 (221) I know of a project on the prosopography of the priests in ancient Rome. A short report can be found in LLC 9 (1995) 4, pp. 320-323. They have also a web page (http://www.uni-potsdam.de/u/klassphilol/srrind.htm). A further project, "Prosopographia Imperii Romani", is located at the Berlin-Brandenburgische Akademie der Wissenschaften (postal address: Jaegerstr. 22/23, D-10117 Berlin, phone: +4930-20370-256); project leader: Prof. Dr. Werner Eck; I had contact with Dr. Matthaeus Heil at the mentioned address. They planned at least to use computers; I am however not informed on the current state of computerization of their work. Best wishes, Wilhelm ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Prof. Dr. Wilhelm Ott phone: +49-7071-2972933 Universitaet Tuebingen fax: +49-7071-295912 Zentrum fuer Datenverarbeitung e-mail: ott@zdv.uni-tuebingen.de Brunnenstrasse 27 D-72074 Tuebingen From: Subject: Re: 10.0516 e-publishing: aspects and artefacts Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 222 (222) [deleted quotation] I wouldn't want to appear to quibble with trivial details in relation with the great significance of the publication itself or of how it demonstrates the growing acceptability of the medium for scolarship, but three points occur to me concerning the URL. 1) The access method ("http:") ought to be mentionned. 2) Since the URL is not delimited, the trailing full-stop (period) could be taken as belonging to it. 3) Because of this, the custom has grown of bracketting URLs with "greater-than" and "less-than" pointed brackets. This is so well established that my mail program identifies URLs in mail messages and lets me double-click on them to open up the site with Netscape. It isn't unique in allowing this, so do several others. So, I suggest that the recommended form of citation read: | de Queiroz, K. 1996. "A phylogenetic approach to biological | nomenclature as an alternative to the Linnean systems in | current use." In: J.L. Reveal, ed. Proceedings of a mini- | symposium on biological nomenclature in the 21st century. | University of Maryland: <http://www.life.umd.edu/bees/96sym.html>. Francois Crompton-Roberts From: Subject: Call For Papers: SIGIR '97 hapax8r8f2l8kj Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 223 (223) [Apologies if you receive multiple copies of this.] CALL FOR PAPERS SIGIR '97 20th International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval DoubleTree Hotel, Philadelphia, PA, USA July 27 -- July 31, 1997 In co-operation with: BCS-IRSG (UK), GI (Germany), IPSJ (Japan), (others pending) ABOUT THE CONFERENCE SIGIR '97 is the twentieth conference in the premier series of research conferences on information retrieval. SIGIR is the major forum for the presentation of new research results, and for the demonstration of new systems and techniques, in information retrieval. The conference attracts a broad range of professionals including theoreticians, developers, publishers, researchers, educators, and designers of systems, interfaces, information bases, and related applications. In 1997, SIGIR is collocated with DL '97, the Second ACM International Conference on Digital Libraries, which will be held July 23-26, 1997 in Philadelphia. We anticipate substantial synergy between these two meetings. CALL FOR PAPERS SIGIR '97 seeks original contributions (i.e. never before published) in the broad field of information storage and retrieval, covering the handling of all types of information, people's behavior in information systems, and theories, models and implementations of information retrieval systems. We encourage discussions of experimental studies, tests of usability, explorations of information retrieval behavior, reports on the performance of large scale systems, and demonstrations of advanced approaches. We prefer theoretical contributions to have sufficient proof of utility to demonstrate their applicability to information retrieval problems. Similarly, reports on small scale experiments should include convincing arguments or simulations to show their likelihood of generalization. TOPICS Topics include, but are not limited to: --Information Retrieval Theory, e.g.: Statistical and Logical Retrieval Models, Data Fusion, Human-Centered Information Retrieval Systems. --User Interaction and Behavior, e.g.: Models of Information Seeking, Interface Design and Experiment, Visualization. --Multimedia Information Retrieval, e.g.: Audio, Video, and Image Retrieval, Links, Composite Documents. --Experimentation, e.g.: Test Collections, Evaluation Measures. --Natural Language Processing, e.g.: Multilingual Retrieval Systems, Summarization, Dialogue Management, Use of Linguistic Resources for Information Retrieval. --Systems and Implementation Issues, e.g.: Integration with Database Systems, Networked Systems and the Internet, Compression, Efficient Query Evaluation. --Applications, e.g.: Task-Embedded Information Retrieval, Electronic Publishing, Digital Libraries. INSTRUCTIONS FOR CONTRIBUTORS Submissions to SIGIR '97 may be completed papers, or can be proposals for posters, panels, demonstrations, tutorials, or workshops. With the exception of papers and posters, submissions may be made via e-mail (plain ASCII text). All submissions should include complete contact information including mail address, telephone, fax, and e-mail. PAPERS Papers (4 copies) should be submitted in English to the Program Co-Chair responsible for the geographic region of the first author, as indicated below. Papers should contain at most 5000 words. The first page must contain the title of the paper and an abstract of not more than 150 words, but no indication as to the author(s) or their affiliation(s). In addition, authors must provide a separate cover page with the title, the author name(s), and the author affiliation(s), plus complete contact information (mailing address, telephone, fax, and e-mail) for the author to whom correspondence should be sent. Please indicate if the paper is to be considered for the Best Student Paper Award. This Award requires that the first and primary author be a fulltime student at time of submission. There will also be a Best Non-Student Paper Award presented. TUTORIALS SIGIR '97 will begin with a full day of tutorials, each of which should cover a single topic in detail. Proposals are solicited for tutorials of either a half day (3 hours plus breaks) or full day (6 hours plus breaks). Submissions should be made to the Tutorials Chair and should include a cover sheet and an extended abstract. The cover sheet should specify (1) the length of the tutorial; (2) the intended audience (introductory, intermediate, advanced); (3) complete contact information for the contact person and other presenters; and (4) brief biographies (max. 2 paragraphs) of the presenters. The extended abstract should be 3 to 5 pages, and should include an outline of the tutorial, along with descriptions of the course objectives and course materials. PANELS Proposals for panel sessions should be sent to the Panels Chair by prospective moderators. Panels should address issues of interest to the general information retrieval community, and should be designed to stimulate lively debate between panelists and audience. Panel proposals (2-3 pages) must include: (1) complete contact information for the moderator; (2) the rationale for addressing this topic as a panel; (3) the names and affiliations of the panel members; and (4) a description of how the panel will be structured, with emphasis on how general participation will be encouraged. Abstracts of panel presentations will appear in the proceedings. DEMONSTRATIONS Demonstrations provide an opportunity for first-hand experience with information retrieval systems, whether advanced operational systems or research prototypes. Proposals (up to 3 pages) should be submitted to the Demonstrations Chair. The proposal should indicate how the demonstration will illustrate new ideas, and should describe the technical specifications of the system. The hardware, software, and network requirements for the demonstration, including the electrical requirements of the equipment, should be indicated. A list of demonstrations will be published in the proceedings. POSTERS SIGIR '97 poster presentations offer researchers an opportunity to present late-breaking results, significant work in progress, or research that is best communicated in an interactive or graphical format. Abstracts of posters will appear in the conference proceedings, and there will be a Best Poster Award. Three copies of an extended abstract (roughly 3-4 pages) should be submitted to the Posters Chair. The abstract should emphasize the research problem and the methods being used, and be headed only by the title of the poster. In addition, a separate cover page is required containing the title of the poster, along with the name and affiliation of the author(s), and complete contact information for the author to whom correspondence should be sent. WORKSHOPS Proposals are solicited from individuals and groups for one-day workshops to be held July 31, 1997. Submissions of up to 3 pages should be made to the {\bf Conference Chair}. They should include the theme and goal of the workshop, the planned activities, the maximum number of participants and the selection process, and a list of potential participants. Also include a CV for each organizer detailing relevant qualifications and experience. After the workshop, organizers are to provide an article summarizing the workshop for SIGIR Forum. IMPORTANT DATES IMMEDIATELY: Subscribe to SIGIR '97 mailing list by writing to sigir97@potomac.ncsl.nist.gov. Information on SIGIR '97 will periodically be sent to the mailing list as well as posted at http://www.acm.org/sigir/conferences/sigir97/index.html. January 10, 1997: Submission of PAPERS to the relevant Program Co-Chair. February 14, 1997: Submission of proposals for POSTERS, PANELS, DEMONSTRATIONS, TUTORIALS and WORKSHOPS to the relevant Chair. March 11, 1997: Notification to ALL authors. April 30, 1997: Final manuscripts for PAPERS, POSTERS and PANELS due in camera-ready and electronic forms. CONTACTS Conference Chair: Ellen Voorhees NIST Building 225 Room A-216 Gaithersburg, MD 20899 USA Email: ellen@potomac.ncsl.nist.gov Phone: +1 301 975-3761 Fax: +1 301 840-1357 Tutorials & Panels Chair: Susan Dumais Bellcore 445 South St. Room 1A-348B Morristown, NJ 07960 USA Email: std@bellcore.com Phone: +1 201 829-4253 Fax: +1 201 829-2645 Posters Chair: K. L. Kwok Computer Science Dept. Queens College CUNY 65-30 Kissena Blvd. Flushing, NY 11367 USA Email: kwok@post.cs.qc.edu Phone: +1 718 997-3482 Fax: +1 718 997-3513 Demonstrations Chair: Chris Buckley Sabir Research, Inc. 26 Triple Crown Ct. Gaithersburg, MD 20878 USA Email: chrisb@sabir.com Phone: +1 301 947-3740 Fax: +1 301 947-3684 Treasurer: Paul B. Kantor SCILS Rutgers University 4 Huntington Street New Brunswick, NJ 08901-1071 USA Email: kantorp@cs.rutgers.edu Phone: +1 908 932-1359 Fax: +1 908 932-1504 Publicity Chair: David D. Lewis AT\&T Labs 600 Mountain Ave., 2A-410 Murray Hill, NJ 07974-0636 USA Email: lewis@research.att.com Phone: +1 908-582-3976 Fax: +1 908-582-7550 PROGRAM CHAIRS For North and South America: Nicholas J. Belkin SCILS Rutgers University 4 Huntington Street New Brunswick, NJ 08901-1071 USA Email: belkin@scils.rutgers.edu Phone: +1 908 932-8585 Fax: +1 908 932-6916 For Europe and Africa: Peter Willett Department of Information Studies University of Sheffield Sheffield S10 2TN United Kingdom Email: p.willett@sheffield.ac.uk Phone: +44 (0) 114-2825083 Fax: +44 (0) 114-2780300 For Asia and the Pacific: Arcot Desai Narasimhalu Institute of Systems Science National University of Singapore Heng Mui Keng Terrace Singapore 0511 Republic of Singapore Email: desai@iss.nus.sg Phone: +65 7722002 Fax: + 65 7744990 PROGRAM COMMITTEE IJsbrand Jan Aalbersberg, Phillips, The Netherlands Maristella Agosti, Univ. of Padua, Italy Micheline Beaulieu, City Univ., UK Peter Bruza, QUT, Australia Chris Buckley, Cornell Univ., USA Forbes Burkowski, Univ. of Waterloo, Canada James Callan, Univ. of Massachusetts, USA Raman Chandrasekar, NCST, India Yves Chiaramella, CLIPS-IMAG, France Hsinchun Chen, Univ. of Arizona, USA Mark Chignell, Univ. of Toronto, Canada Ken Church, AT\&T, USA W. Bruce Croft, Univ. of Massachusetts, USA Susan Dumais, Bellcore, USA Leo Egghe, Limburgs Univ. Centrum, Belgium David Ellis, Univ. of Sheffield, UK Jim French, Univ. of Virginia, USA Hans-Peter Frei, UBILAB, Switzerland Norbert Fuhr, Univ. Dortmund, Germany Gregory Grefenstette, Rank Xerox, France Donna Harman, NIST, USA David Harper, Robert Gordon Univ., UK Marti Hearst, Xerox, USA Bill Hersh, Oregon Health Sciences Univ., USA Haym Hirsh, Rutgers Univ., USA David Hull, Rank Xerox, France Peter Ingwersen, Royal School of Librarianship, Denmark Tetsuya Ishikawa, Univ. of Library and Info. Sci., Japan Kalervo Jarvelin, University of Tampere, Finland Haruo Kimoto, NTT, Japan Judith Klavans, Columbia University ,USA Shmuel Klein, Bar-Ilan Univ., Israel Robert Korfhage, Univ. of Pittsburgh, USA K. L. Kwok, Queens College, CUNY, USA Dik Lee, HKUST, Hong Kong Joon Ho Lee, KRDIC, Korea David Lewis, AT\&T, USA Elizabeth Liddy, Syracuse Univ., USA Dario Lucarella, CRA-ENEL, Italy Kathy McKeowan, Columbia Univ., USA Elke Mittendorf, ETH Zentrum, Switzerland Alistair Moffat, Univ. of Melbourne, Australia Sung Hyun Myaeng, Chungnam National Univ., Korea Jan Pedersen, Verity, USA Annelise Pejtersen, National Laboratory, Denmark Keith van Rijsbergen, Glasgow University, UK Ellen Riloff, Univ. of Utah, USA Stephen Robertson, City Univ., UK Airi Salminen, Univ. of Jyvaskyla, Finland Tefko Saracevic, Rutgers Univ., USA Peter Schauble, ETH Zentrum, Switzerland Fabrizio Sebastiani, IEI-CHR, Italy Alan Smeaton, Dublin City Univ., Ireland Phil Smith, Ohio State Univ., USA Craig Stanfill, Ab Initio, USA Ulrich Thiel, GMD IPSI, Germany Richard Tong, Sageware, USA Howard Turtle, West Info. Pub. Gp., USA Ross Wilkinson, RMIT, Australia Mei-Mei Wu, National Taiwan Normal Univ., Taiwan Emannuel Yannakoudakis, Athens Univ. of Economics, Greece From: Subject: holiday book donation? Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 224 (224) The following message was forwarded to me. I am not certain whether it is genuine or a hoax. I sent a message, but received no response. Perhaps a fellow humanist could confirm or deny its validity? If it is true it is certainly a worthwhile endeavor. [deleted quotation]__________________________________ Pamela Cohen Center for Electronic Texts in the Humanities 169 College Avenue, New Brunswick NJ 08903 phone: (908) 932-1384 / fax: (908) 932-1386 http://www.ceth.rutgers.edu pac@rci.rutgers.edu __________________________________ From: schubert@fhf-tue.com (Klaus Schubert) Subject: job announcement Date: Tue, 03 Dec 1996 09:49:02 +0100 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 225 (225) Die Fachhochschule Flensburg stellt, zeitlich befristet vom 1.2.1997 bis 31.7.1998 (Beschaeftigungsfoerderungsgesetz), eine LEHRKRAFT FUER BESONDERE AUFGABEN fuer den Studiengang Technikuebersetzen zur Unterstuetzung des wiedergewaehlten Prorektors im Bereich der Lehre ein. Die Lehrgebiete umfassen Sprachkompetenz Englisch, Landeskunde, Technisches Uebersetzen (Deutsch-Englisch), Uebersetzungslehre. Die Ausschreibung richtet sich ausschliesslich an englische Muttersprachler/innen mit wissenschaftlichem Abschluss in einem sprachwissenschaftlichen Fach. Verguetung: BAT II a. Schwerbehinderte Bewerberinnen und Bewerber werden bei entsprechender Eignung bevorzugt beruecksichtigt. Die Fachhochschule Flensburg ist bestrebt, den Anteil von Wissenschaftlerinnen in Forschung Lehre zu erhoehen und fordert deshalb entsprechend qualifizierte Frauen ausdruecklich auf, sich zu bewerben. Bewerbungen mit den ueblichen Unterlagen werden bis zum 9. Januar 1997 (Eingang) erbeten an den: Kanzler der Fachhochschule Flensburg, Kanzleistr. 91-93, D-24943 Flensburg, Deutschland Klaus Schubert schubert@fhf-tue.com Studiengang Technikuebersetzen Fachhochschule Flensburg Am Bundesbahnhof 1 Tel +49 (461) 144 97-12 D-24937 Flensburg Fax +49 (461) 2 11 25 Deutschland/Germanio/Tyskland/Duitsland/Germany From: Subject: Re: 10.0518 prosopography Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 226 (226) There is a major project going on at Dumbarton Oaks in Washington DC, which is constructing a database of, among other things, prosopographical material from Byzantine sources. I saw a demonstration of it recently: it combines full, accessible texts of the sources (mostly hagiographical) with a search engine for names, places, themes and lots else. It is already available for purchase for the pilot period (10th-11th centuries?) and will continue to be expanded chronologically. I don't have contact information right in front of me but can supply it if asked. I think the project deserves being included in any list of current prosopographical research projects. Larry Poos Department of History Catholic University POOS@CUA.EDU From: Willard McCarty Subject: bibliography of MUD; AltaVista in Europe Date: Fri, 13 Dec 1996 10:04:52 +0000 () X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 227 (227) Apropos the recent discussion of MUDs and the like, I have stumbled upon an online bibliography: Daniel Pargman, "The MUD literature reference list", at <http://miamimoo.mcs.muohio.edu/mudlit.html>. Unfortunately it appears to have last been modified on 16 Apr 1995. More recent information would be welcome, I am sure. Humanists in Europe may also like to try out the new Swedish mirror of AltaVista, at <http://www.altavista.telia.com>. You get to choose the language in which the engine speaks back to you. WM ---------------------- Dr. Willard McCarty, Senior Lecturer / Centre for Computing in the Humanities King's College London / Strand / London WC2R 2LS U.K. voice: +44 (0)171 873 2784 / fax: +44 (0)171 873 5081 Willard.McCarty@kcl.ac.uk From: Danilo Curci Subject: Re: 10.0507 new in American Verse Project Date: Thu, 12 Dec 1996 00:21:47 +0100 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 228 (228) Thank you. I and my friend Terenzio Formenti, a poet, are collecting sites and... poems on http://www.aspide.it/freeweb/librarsi/ in italian but also in several other languages. Danilo (Italy) At 14.12 11/12/96 EST, you wrote: [deleted quotation] From: Subject: Editing conference Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 229 (229) [Cross-posted from Ficino, with thanks. --WM] Can I just remind anyone interested in participating in the 'Future(s) of Editing' session at the ESSE 4 conference in Debrecen, Hungary in September that the closing date for receipt of abstracts in 31 January 1997. Proposals should relate to any issues in contemporary editorial thinking (eg, the sociology of texts; revisionism; the electronic text; editing and poststructuralism; gender and editing) and can treat of texts from any period. Proposals should be sent to the address indicated below. Please feel free to contact me if you require further details or have any queries. Dr. Andrew Murphy English Department University of Hertfordshire Watford Campus Aldenham Watford Herts AL1 3BD UK Email: litradm@herts.ac.uk Phone: +44 (0) 1727 864117 From: Subject: Re: 10.0525 job at Flensburg Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 230 (230) I maintain the Related Readings page, which contains a section called "Job Opporunities," for the Institute for Advanced Technology in the Humanities at UVA. I would love to post Jeff Allen's recent job anouncement [10.0525 job at Flensburg] in this section, but I do not speak or read German. Could Mr. Allen please briefly describe the job in question, so that I may categorize it correctly? Thanks, Jennifer Hoyt From: mgk3k@faraday.clas.virginia.edu Subject: electronic dissertations news and updates -- for Humanist Date: Sun, 15 Dec 1996 17:08:49 -0500 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 231 (231) If you haven't been by the electronic theses and dissertations site lately, you might want to take a look; there have been a number of recent additions to the ETD projects directory, and I have also just added a link to the ETD submission guidelines which UMI has recently released. In addition, I have placed on-line a draft of a paper entitled "Electronic Publishing and Doctoral Dissertations in the Humanities," which I will be presenting at the upcoming MLA. Commentary would be most appreciated. All of this is at: http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/ETD/ETD.html (The essay and the link to UMI are off of the "about ETDs" section.) --Matt ==================================================================== Matthew G. Kirschenbaum University of Virginia mgk3k@virginia.edu Department of English http://faraday.clas.virginia.edu/~mgk3k Electronic Text Center From: Stefania Spina Subject: New web page on italian linguistics Date: Sun, 15 Dec 1996 14:22:08 +0000 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 232 (232) [Apologies if you receive multiple copies of this.] I'm pleased to announce a new Web Page concerning italian linguistics, whose name is Linguaggio e Comunicazione. You can visit it at the URL http://www.umbrars.com/lingua Its main resource is my HTML version of 1872-73 linguistics unpublished lessons of italian linguist Giovanni Flechia (1811-1892). I've been working on the original manuscript (226 pages written by a student of the University of Torino) since 1992 (I first converted it in electronic format, then I decided to put it on the Internet and offer it to all the interested linguists). The subject of these lessons (in italian) deals with latin and italian morphology, with many digressions on italian dialects. The linguistic relevance of the text is great, because Flechia was probably, in those years well known as fundamental for the birth of italian language science, the only linguist who can be "compared" to G.I. Ascoli, the father of italian linguistics. My pages are (for the moment) only in italian and contain also: a) a small archive on language-concerning articles published by italian newspapers; b) information and data on my paper about the feminine names of job in italian literature. Any comments and suggestions are welcomed. ----------------------------- Stefania Spina Perugia - Italy sspina@mbox.vol.it http://www.umbrars.com/lingua From: H-TEACH Subject: suspicious minds, or to catch a thief Date: Fri, 13 Dec 1996 21:45:56 -0600 (CST) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 233 (233) A post-script to yesterday's message about plagiarism from the schoolsucks.com website: The student who handed in a paper straight off of schoolsucks handed in a paper to my graduate student's class that seemed suspicious. The paper wasn't listed on schoolsucks, so I took an unusual phrase from the paper ("predetermined preference") and entered it on Alta Vista's search engine. The search took about 10 seconds. Out of 8 million web documents containing 16 billion words catalogued by Alta Vista, that phrase showed up on 2 documents. One of the two was an alternative site for term papers, and contained the precise paper this student had handed in. So, if you come across any suspicious papers as the semester runs down, you may want to pay a visit to http://swissnet.ai.mit.edu/alta-vista.html One hint for search engine newbies: A search on "predetermined preference" with the quotation marks in Alta Vista brings up just two sites, both of which have that exact phrase. A search on predetermined preference without the quotation marks brings up 60,000 sites, which includes all sites that have either phrase. Sincerely, Jeffrey Segal Department of Political Science SUNY Stony Brook Stony Brook, NY 11794-4392 (516) 632-7662 fax: (516) 632-9023 From: mkreid@PLANET.EON.NET (Mary-Karen Reid) Subject: Re: 10.0522 holiday book donation? Date: 96-12-14 23:27:21 EST X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 234 (234) Reply-to: mkreid@PLANET.EON.NET (Mary-Karen Reid) To: SOCWORK@UAFSYSB.UARK.EDU (Multiple recipients of list SOCWORK) More on the books for hospitals message I forwarded earlier - the following just received. m-k [deleted quotation] From: Emily Rose Subject: Re: A Mitzvah (fwd) Date: Fri, 13 Dec 1996 22:14:34 -0500 (EST) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 235 (235) This is the response I received from my brother about the Houghton Mifflin contribution (which I duly forwarded to him).... Lessee...I have, as of last count, received 37 copies of that message from well-meaning friends, relatives and employees. While the spirit behind it was noble, in practice the people at Hougton Mifflin ought to be taken out and shot. I sent them a lengthy note berating them for this stupid stunt last week, after about the 17th copy I received. Meanwhile, don't bother sending them any mail. Their target was was 50,000 notes (that relate to their Polar Express web site, not that you would realize that from the netspam that is circulating) by December 31st, and they have long since surpassed that number (by starting a chain that will never die, rather like the send-a-card-to-Craig-Shergold UL). But Happy Holidays anyway. [sigh] -David [Grinch] Rose At 01:18 PM 12/13/96 -0500, Emily Rose wrote: [deleted quotation] From: Subject: NINCH Announce: Paul Peters' Radio Symposium Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 236 (236) NINCH ANNOUNCEMENT Tuesday Dec 17 BROADCAST OF RECORDING OF SYMPOSIUM WITH PAUL EVAN PETERS [deleted quotation] From: PMC Subject: PMC call for peers Date: Tue, 17 Dec 1996 17:23:34 -0500 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 237 (237) PMC: Essays Currently Available for Peer Review Self-nominated peer-reviewers regularly participate in the editorial process of _Postmodern Culture_. All submissions distributed for review have been screened by the editors and will receive two other readings from members of the journal's permanent editorial board; _Postmodern Culture_ preserves the anonymity of both authors and reviewers in this process, but the comments of reviewers will be forwarded to the author. If you would like to review one of the submissions described below, and if you think you can complete that review within two weeks of receiving the essay, please send a note to the editors at pmc@jefferson.village.virginia.edu outlining your qualifications as a reviewer of the work in question (experience in the subject area, publications, interest), identifying the MS by number as listed below, and specifying the manner in which you would like to receive the essay (electronic mail or World-Wide Web). We will select one self-nominated reviewer for each of the works listed below, and we will notify reviewers within two weeks. Information gathered during this process about potential reviewers will be kept on file at PMC for future reference, and may be made available for online searching by PMC subscribers seeking expertise in a particular field. Please note: members of the journal's permanent editorial board should not nominate themselves in response to this call. Manuscripts for review: MS#1: An examination of a Salman Rushdie's short book on the film version of _The Wizard of Oz_, published in 1992 as part of the British Film Institute's Film Classics series. Rushdie's concluding note about the film offers an intriguing re-interpretation of the famous line, "there's no place like home," and the author takes this point as an opening to an intersection of pschoanalysis, marxism, and postcolonial studies. References include Freud and Langley. MS#2: A look at Lenny Bruce's 1962 obscenity trial, and at Bruce's role as a Jewish entertainer and lightning rod mediating San Francisco's civic structure, countercultures, and entertainment substratum. The author also looks at issues of censorship, which are equally relevant in the modern's struggle over cultural expression. References include Gates, Fischer, and Crenshaw. MS #3: This essay examines the intense yet distant humanity in Sylvia Plath's poems, using Emmanual Levinas's metaethical emphasis on the _affect_ of the other to consider the "pathos of aethetics." The author proposes that Plath's poetry provokes feeling and empathy, but not compassion or sympathy. References include Young, Rose, and Ramazani. MS #4: An examination of the relationship of truth and media, and the importance of an exterior-centered language: lies are easily pointed out but truth is identified by its absence rather than by its presence. This identification, moreover, is done by the power that controls discourse. But, the author feels, the power that tries to control this discourse between truth and lie, life and death, transforms a democracy into dictatorship. References include Couillard, Rorty, and Vattimo. MS #5: An examination of the "logic in the secret" of Deleuze-Guattari's theory of literary forms, particularly in _A Thousand Plateaux_ where the concept of the secret is placed in the classification of the tale and the novella. This is illustrated in analyses of Maupassant and Duras. References include Levinas, Hegel, and Foucault. MS #6: An essay looking at %Geschlecht% in Derrida's readings of Heidegger, in "%Geschlecht% II: Heidegger's Hand" and in his other discussions of Heidegger. The author looks at the import of the "frighteningly polysemic and practically untranslatable word" in these works and in the works in the "yet-to-come." References include Krell, McNeill, and Ulmer. MS #7: A look at interactive multilinear narrative and the possiblities for authorial collaboration in internet texts and internet textuality. It considers the problems of maintaining both coherence and the identity of a text as text on the interactive internet. References include Lyotard, Simon, and Keep. MS #8: A look at a 1966 Derrida comment on Einstein ("The Einsteinian constant is not a constant, not a center...") and its role in the recent "Science Wars." The author argues that this recent prominence reveals a deeper cluster of problems in the relationship between postmodernism and science, and seeks to examine the context of the remark and find a path for a more constructive scientific response to Derrida's work. MS #9: This essay looks at Pynchon's _Gravity's Rainbow_, and tensions between high unities and low popular genres on the novel, and the resulting centralized and marginialized discourses. References include Bahktin, Jameson, Stallybrass, and White. MS #10: A hypertext essay on social media and self-exchange. MS #11: A essay looking at the list, which straddles the coherent and the incoherent and which groups together elements which may or may not predict the future but whose existence predicts the present. Lists also use the concept of exchange, which works across boundaries that must both limit and separate. The list is a familiar rhetorical device of postmodern writing. The author follows this path to look at postmodernism in terms of the external and internal limits of conceptualism amd to discuss the act of and concept of exchange. References include Vattimo, Marx, and Saussure, From: jager@let.rug.nl Subject: 2nd CFP - Language Teaching and Language Technology Date: Tue, 17 Dec 1996 10:25:01 +0000 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 238 (238) Language Teaching and Language Technology 28-29 April 1997 University of Groningen The Netherlands Second call for papers The prospects for Computer-Assisted Language Learning (CALL) today are better than ever before. This is undoubtedly due to the broader range of tasks computers can now be put to, but also to the recent success of applying language technological research (e.g. in morphological and syntactic parsing and generation, speech recognition and synthesis, semantic classification, and corpus linguistics) to practical tasks in language learning and teaching. At the same time, the new technology calls into question traditional didactic insights, asking for new learning and teaching strategies. We hope that the conference may provide answers to some of the following questions: 1.How can language technology (speech recognition/synthesis, morphological and syntactic parsing/generation, semantic classification) be further harnessed in support of language learning? 2.How may results of corpus linguistics be incorporated into CALL? 3.How good is CALL compared to language learning without benefit of computer assistance? Can one measure improvements, and do these involve speed, proficiency or enthusiasm of CALL students? 4.Are the different subfields of language instruction differently amenable to computer assistance--viz., reading, writing, speaking, listening, testing, translation? 5.What is the role in CALL for traditional support tools such as (analog) language labs, paper dictionaries, or hand-held grammars? 6.What are the pedagogical consequences of exploiting this technology? Are there mixed and/or partial options? 7.Is computer-assisted learning always computer-assisted instruction? Isn't virtually all language-learning done under instruction? 8.What are the results of large-scale use of CALL in language education programs? When can it be effective? 9.What are the opportunities for long-distance learning? 10.What and where is the market for CALL products? How does one reach it? Although we solicit papers on all aspects of CALL, we are particularly interested in the question of matching language technology to educational needs. The perspective of the program committee comes from language teaching and language technology. Invited Speakers: -Frank Borchardt, Executive Director, CALICO (Computer-Assisted Language Instruction Consortium). On Current Didactic Issues in CALL -Stephen Heppell, ULTRALAB/Anglia Polytechnic University, Essex. On Educational Policy and CALL -Lauri Karttunnen, Rank Xerox, Grenoble. On the Technological Horizon. -Joke van der Ven, Wolters-Noordhoff Publishers. On the Publisher's Perspective. Abstracts We solicit papers of 20 min (plus 10 min discussion). Abstracts of not more than 8 pp. (A4) including figures and references should be marked "Attention: CALL Conf." and submitted by Jan 15, 1997 to: Arthur van Essen, Applied Linguistics Postbus 716 Rijksuniversiteit Groningen NL 9700 AS Groningen The Netherlands Email submissions are likewise welcome. They must meet the same length requirement, must be either in plain ASCII or in postscript. Include "Attention: CALL Conf" in the subject line and send to call-conf@let.rug.nl. Software demonstrations are also invited. Programme committee: -Paul Bogaards (Computer-Assisted Instruction, Leiden) -Arthur van Essen (Applied Linguistics, Groningen, co-chair) -Erhard Hinrichs (Computational Linguistics, Tuebingen) -Sake Jager, (English & Computer Assisted Instruction, Groningen, co-chair) -Franciska de Jong (Linguistics, Utrecht & Computer Science, Twente) -Tibor Kiss (IBM, Heidelberg) John Nerbonne (Computational Linguistics, Groningen, co-chair) For further details and registration information, please visit the conference site at http://www.let.rug.nl/~call97 or send an e-mail message to call-conf@let.rug.nl. From: Subject: Re: 10.523 citations in e-publications Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 239 (239) One more point on citations to add to what Francois Crompton-Roberts said: given the ephemeral quality of many URLs, I have seen many citations that give the exact date of download as well. Pat Galloway MS Dept. of Archives and History From: Deian Hopkin Subject: Fawcett Library Date: Tue, 17 Dec 1996 08:37:35 -0500 (EST) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 240 (240) FAWCETT LIBRARY APPEAL Just as an interim "thank you", I thought I ought to tell you that the response to the message you put out on my behalf on Humanist has elicited the most astonishing response. I have received, to date, 126 messages from all over the world, from Budapest to Adelaide, Oslo to Tokyo. Many of the messages are fullsome, which all goes to prove that everything we believed about the reputation and role of the Fawcett in the international scholarly community is borne out. It is immensely gratifying that so many people have taken time to write. But even the simple lines of support show that people really are supporting this venture, and this helps us enormously. Beyond this, the message has been passed on to other bulletin boards and this is now cascading a new wave of messages. So, coincidentally, we have demonstrated something of the proselytising power of the internet. A nice of piece of empirical evidence for the piece I am sure one of us will write about new paradigms for scholarly exchange ! A simple diagramatic representation of the networks through which this particular message travelled would be fascinating. Still, another time.... I propose to issue a bulletin from time to time,informing our friends of progress on the venture. In the meantime, may I thank you for your help With very best wishes for Christmas Deian ********************************* Deian Hopkin Vice Provost London Guildhall University hopkin@lgu.ac.uk 0171 320 1129 From: "Paul [not Brian] Brians" Subject: Houghton Mifflin campaign over Date: Mon, 16 Dec 1996 09:15:52 -0500 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 241 (241) [deleted quotation] **MISSION ACCOMPLISHED** With Your Help The Campaign has Reached its Goal Over 2,000 Hospitalized Children Receive Books! Thanks to you, the Internet community, we have reached our goal of 50,000 messages and HMI is currently distributing 2,000 books to hospitalized children who can't be home for the holidays. In recognition of the amazing and voluminous show of support from people all over the world, Houghton Mifflin plans to donate an additional 500 books to these children. During the campaign, we encouraged people to share messages of favorite holiday thoughts and memories with the internet community. Now that we have reached our goal, we still welcome you to post messages here by clicking the button above. However we are no longer accepting email messages at "share@hmco.com". Many thanks to all who have participated. We appreciate your support. Paul Brians, Department of English,Washington State University Pullman, WA 99164-5020 brians@wsu.edu http://www.wsu.edu:8080/~brians From: "[ISO-8859-1] Kivim=E4ki Arto J" Subject: Advent Calendar in Latin Date: Wed, 18 Dec 1996 03:28:36 -0800 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 242 (242) Dies natalis Christi advenit. Quid agitur in fabrica Patris Natalis? What happens in the house of Father Christmas? Vide: http://www.yle.fi/ylenykko/natalis/index.html Arto -- LABOR FATIGAT -- Arto Kivim{ki Pitknsillanranta 7-9 b 72 00530 Helsinki Finland tel. (90) 766 350 From: James O'Donnell Subject: help with Xmas cards Date: Mon, 16 Dec 1996 21:22:27 -0500 (EST) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 243 (243) A glitch in a systems upgrade -- I let somebody else upgrade my machine and I'll never do that again -- lost my "address" directory, so Christmas cards looked pretty intimidating, until I remembered Yahoo's People Search: =09http://www.yahoo.com/search/people/ I had about twenty addresses I couldn't get any other way, and I got 19 of them from Yahoo. The one exception was the man with a *really* common first-name/last-name combination and all I remember is that he lives in a north shore Chicago suburb: about 20 people match that description, so I had to work at it by calling his office. Otherwise, it's amazingly effective and quick. Jim O'Donnell Classics, U. of Penn jod@ccat.sas.upenn.edu From: Sara Vandenberg Subject: Re: 10.0527 e-diss; Italian linguistics; plagarism Date: Mon, 16 Dec 1996 14:22:03 -0800 (PST) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 244 (244) I just checked the Shakespeare papers included on the "schoolsucks.com" list. No one I know in any university, college, or high school would give any of those papers a passing grade. Sara van den Berg University of Washington From: shlomo Subject: Windows Fonts for transliterated Hebrew Date: Tue, 17 Dec 1996 12:23:29 -0500 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 245 (245) Hi there! I am trying to find Windows fonts for transliterating Hebrew and other Semitic languages. Specifically, I am looking for fonts with underdotted h, z, and macrons over vowels. If you know where I could obtain such fonts, please let me know. Thank you very much for your consideration. Shlomo Sela Computer Center, Bar Ilan University. Ramat Gan, Israel From: "Jerome V. Brown" Subject: Identification of a Poem for a Former Student. Date: Mon, 16 Dec 1996 09:16:11 -0500 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 246 (246) Can anyone help me with this poem? The request for the author and a source for the complete text came to me a couple of months ago from a student I taught here at the University of Windsor some 30 years ago. She wrote me not because I taught her English (my field is philosophy), but because I'm still alive and still here. So far I've drawn a blank. I gather she's had some kind of difficulty in her life and is trying to pick up the pieces and get them back together, though she didn't go into much detail on that. She seemed to think that the poem was important for her recovery. "The verse of the poem which I remember," she writes, "is, You will be what you will be, Let failure find its false content With that poor work environment, But spirit scorns it, and is free." "And a subsequent verse," she continues, "goes something like, It masters Time, it conquers space, And cows that boastful Trickster, chance, ...be not impatient with delay, but wait as one who understands - When Spirit rises and commands, The gods are willing to obey." I've copied it exacly as she sent it to me. Any help will be appreciated. Jerry Brown From: Subject: Re: Prosopography Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 247 (247) Dear Willard McCarty last Saturday I was at a meeting where Anna Carolina Strasky presented her prosopographical database of all students of the Basle "Predigerschule" (1875-1915). For more informations, you can write to: Anna Carolina Strasky, lic. phil., Nonnenweg 66, CH-4055 Basel, Switzerland. Best regards, Rainer Henrich Rainer Henrich, lic. theol. Bullinger-Briefwechsel-Edition Phone: xx41 1 257 67 54 Kirchgasse 9 Fax: xx41 1 262 14 12 CH-8001 Zuerich e-mail: henrich@theol.unizh.ch Switzerland http://www.unizh.ch/irg/henrich.html From: Willard McCarty Subject: Sokal's hoax Date: Tue, 17 Dec 1996 17:27:50 +0000 () X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 248 (248) Northrop Frye used to say, noting its lack in literary studies, that an academic field could properly be called a discipline if a coherent theory could be constructed for it. I have argued that if humanities computing has such a theory, it must be based on the idea of modeling, which is to say, the question of how we know what we know as this may be illuminated by computational methods of investigating humanities data. The difference between evidence and what we know when we think about that evidence cannot wholly or even principally be attributed to an insufficient amount of data, or to insufficiently sophisticated algorithms, as can be shown when one looks closely at a properly delimited study. There is always a gap, I would argue, between mechanical precision, no matter how fine, and the imaginative precision of language (to take just one of the natural media we have). At base this is not a particularly new argument, though its application to humanities data may be. If, then, we are defined by the discrepancy between evidence and knowledge, the ontological status of evidence is an important matter. It seems to me that as computing humanists we need to posit that objectively true conclusions about the artefacts we study are possible while at the same time realising that a computational model of them will by nature always be defective. If I am not mistaken, the postmodern argument works fundamentally against the idea that such objectively true conclusions are possible. Humanists may, therefore, be particularly interested in a piece by Paul Boghossian (Philosophy, New York Univ), "What the Sokal hoax ought to teach us", in the latest Times Literary Supplement, No. 4889 (13 December 1996), pp. 14-15. Boghossian's article is in reference to a deliberate hoax staged by Alan Sokal, a theoretical physicist at New York University. Sokal simultaneously published a bogus article about the postmodern implications of 20th-century physical theories in the premier journal Social Text and in Lingua Franca an expose of this article, a "farrago of deliberate solecisms, howlers, and non-sequiturs, sitched together so as to look good and to flatter the ideological preconceptions of the editors" of ST. Boghossian argues that at the heart of the issue raised by Sokal's hoax is "not the mere existence of incompetence within the academy, but rather that specific form of it that arises from allowing ideological criteria to displace standards of scholarship so completely that not even considerations of intelligibility are seen as relevant to an argument's acceptability." What Boghossian sees as "simple-minded relativistic views about truth and evidence that are commonly identified as 'postmodernist'" lead, he argues, to a state of mind, exemplified by the editors of ST, for which scholarly standards become irrelevant, and thus deliberate nonsense acceptable. The basic texts are on the Web. See 1. "Sokal and Social Text", <http://weber.u.washington.edu/~jwalsh/sokal/> 2. "The Sokal Affair", <http://www.keele.ac.uk/depts/stt/stt/sokal.htm> 3. The online publication, Upstream, at <http://www.cycad.com/cgi-bin/Upstream/>, "a home for the intellectually heterodox, the politically incorrect and other independent thinkers"; use the Search mechanism to find the items on "Sokal". Comments? WM ---------------------- Dr. Willard McCarty, Senior Lecturer Centre for Computing in the Humanities King's College London / Strand / London WC2R 2LS U.K. voice: +44 (0)171 873 2784 / fax: +44 (0)171 873 5081 Willard.McCarty@kcl.ac.uk From: Francois Lachance Subject: possible def'n of hum.being Date: Mon, 16 Dec 1996 14:09:19 -0500 (EST) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 249 (249) Willard, As usual, your editorial asides often provoke some reflection. To be human & humane is to listen to the tale of extenuating circumstances. But a machine can select from a stock of tales... Austin somewhere has a paper on excuses where there is distinction between "accident" and "mistake". Would be interesting to apply to computer-human interaction... -- Francois From: KNAPPEN@VKPMZD.kph.Uni-Mainz.DE Subject: Re: 10.0537 fonts for Hebrew? identify a poem? Date: Thu, 19 Dec 1996 11:43:03 +0100 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 250 (250) Instead of looking for a special font for hebrew transliteration I suggest choosing a typesetting system which can apply arbitrary accents to any base letter. Of course, I have TeX in mind here, which is freely available for almost every operating system you can imagine. You can ask questions about TeX in the newsgroup comp.text.tex or in the mailing lists info-tex@shsu.edu (to subscribe: send mail to LISTSERV@SHSU.EDU containing the one line subscribe info-tex "Your full name" and ivritex@taunivm.bitnet (subscription to LISTSERV@TAUNIVM.BITNET) Yours, J"org Knappen. From: Haradda@aol.com Subject: Re: 10.0537 fonts for Hebrew? identify a poem? Date: Thu, 19 Dec 1996 01:24:02 -0500 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 251 (251) Corel wordperfect for system 7 has several hebrew fonts. In fact Corel system 7 has a number of fonts packaged with it. I would check some of the shareware collections on the web. I know that Simtel has hebrew fonts but that is for Dos. From: "Gregory L. Glover" Subject: Re: 10.0537 fonts for Hebrew Date: Wed, 18 Dec 1996 16:02:38 -0500 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 252 (252) There is a series of free fonts (Hebrew and transliteration) for Windows available via ftp from Scholars Press: ftp://scholar.cc.emory.edu/pub/fonts/windows/ --Greg From: Roger Brisson Subject: Sokal's hoax Date: Thu, 19 Dec 1996 08:56:17 -0500 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 253 (253) For Humanist: Willard, unless I misunderstand you, I'm not sure who, except the strongest critics of postmodernism, would accept your contention that postmodernists would deny that such objective truths as you mention are possible. Like that other mud-slinging epithet 'liberalism,' critics have dumped just about every intellectual evil imaginable on postmodernism, so that, just like Zelig in that classic Woody Allen film, postmodernism can take on a bewildering variety of forms. The computational model you postulate-- that data, artefacts, or conclusions we come up with can be assessed based on criteria (the model) that we ourselves devise-- is a simple construct of 'objectivity' that even the slave in Plato's Meno would have little problem accepting as valid. In truth, Sokal's hoax ought to teach us that all is not well in the world of scholarly communication. Clearly, what failed and failed miserably with the Sokal article is critical peer and editorial review. Anyone who has read his article, anyone reasonably grounded in the humanities and the social sciences, should have little problem recognizing the humorously silly intent of much of what he writes. In our assembly line, crank-those-articles-out mentality to contemporary scholarship, the standards of good journal editing and review have fallen to dangerous levels. I don't know what kind of critical review submitted manuscripts receive for the journal that published the Sokal article, but it is evident the reviewers did not carefully read the Sokal text. Because of the lack of time to carefully read submitted manuscripts, editors-in-chief typically rely heavily on the reputations of authors in assessing the quality of a work. In reality, a significant amount of trust forms the basis for keeping the edifice of contemporary scholarly publishing erect. In my opinion, it was Sokal's breach of this trust that should deserve much more public scrutiny than it has received, certainly more than his belittling postmodernism (again, I would argue that current fashion is the reason for this). Sokal's essay was published in great part because of his reputation. I'm convinced that if, say, a Carl Sagan published a carefully written 'hoax' essay for an astronomy or physics journal, filled with bogus conclusions and questionable data, the potential for it 'slipping' through and being published would be very high. Unlike Sokal, however, if Sagan were to do this astronomy or physics would not be taken to task, but rather Sagan's academic integrity. Roger Brisson Penn State University From: Matt Kirschenbaum Subject: Re: 10.0533 Sokal's hoax & human beings Date: Thu, 19 Dec 1996 00:35:44 -0500 (EST) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 254 (254) Well there are two sides to every story, and while I haven't seen the Boghossian piece, these brief quotations from Willard: [deleted quotation] and [deleted quotation] basically restate Sokal's own position and polemic. The best thing I've read on the whole mess is Joe Amato's "sokal text: another funny thing happened on the way to the forum" in the _electronic book review_, which argues that the exchange between Sokal and the editors of _Social Text_ should have been on-line from the outset (as was much of its fallout). I'd add though that the "effectiveness" of Sokal's actions depended precisely on the publishing conventions associated with the material properties of print media. Amato's article is at: http://www.altx.com/ebr/ebr3/amsokal.html --Matt ================================================================= Matthew G. Kirschenbaum University of Virginia mgk3k@virginia.edu Department of English http://faraday.clas.virginia.edu/~mgk3k/ Electronic Text Center From: Bornstein Subject: Re: 10.0533 Sokal's hoax & human beings Date: Wed, 18 Dec 1996 18:00:48 -0500 (EST) X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 255 (255) Hi, Willard I agree that the Sokal Affair raises interesting questions for all humanists, and perhaps especially so for those of us interested in computing in the humanities. You and the list members might want to know that Sokal maintains his own website, with the original articles and lots of related info. Here's the address: http://www.nyu.edu/gsas/dept/physics/faculty/sokal/index.html Best wishes to all for the holidays. --George ********************************************************************* George Bornstein Department of English C.A. Patrides Professor of Literature University of Michigan email: georgeb@umich.edu Ann Arbor, Mich. 48109-1045 office phone: (313) 764-6330 office fax: (313) 763-3128 From: Subject: Re: 10.0537 fonts for Hebrew? identify a poem? Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 256 (256) WILL. (by Wilcox, Ella Wheeler) 1 You will be what you will to be; 2 Let failure find its false content 3 In that poor word "environment," 4 But spirit scorns it, and is free. 5 It masters time, it conquers space, 6 It cowes that boastful trickster Chance, 7 And bids the tyrant Circumstance 8 Uncrown and fill a servant's place. 9 The human Will, that force unseen, 10 The offspring of a deathless Soul, 11 Can hew the way to any goal, 12 Though walls of granite intervene. 13 Be not impatient in delay, 14 But wait as one who understands; 15 When spirit rises and commands, 16 The gods are ready to obey. 17 The river seeking for the sea 18 Confronts the dam and precipice, 19 Yet knows it cannot fail or miss; 20 You will be what you will to be! Courtesy of Chadwyck-Healey's Literature Online service From: DARWIN@iris.uncg.edu Subject: Internet Latin course (fwd) Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 257 (257) NOTICE! The departament of classics (Federal University of Parana, Brazil) and the departament of Sciences of Antiquity (Zaragoza University, Spain), have organizated an introductive course of latin via internet. The course starts the 9th jannuary 1996. Subscribtions are opened to 1st jannuary. Informations about this course: http://www.humanas.ufpr.br/delin/classic/latim/esp/interlat.htm clssics home-page: http://www.humanas.ufpr.br/delin/classic/classic.htm alessandro@coruja.humanas.ufpr.br pilar@coruja.humanas.ufpr.br (to 18/12/96) pilar.rivero@msf.unizar.es (from 20/12/96) Please, help us to distrubute this notice. Thanks. M. Pilar Rivero pilar@coruja.humanas.ufpr.br pilar.rivero@msf.unizar.es From: David Green Subject: NINCH ANNOUNCEMENT: 2 WIPO Treaties Pass Date: X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 258 (258) Today in Geneva two of the three WIPO treaties were approved. The database treaty (No. 3) failed, but the treaties on Internet Copyright (Treaty No. 1, for "the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works") and the so-called the "new instrument" for the "Protection of The Rights of Performers And Producers of Phonograms" (Treaty 2) were passed. The treaties were changed from the August 30, 1996 drafts which had been published on the Internet. We haven't had the opportunity to see the new language yet, but reportedly there have been a few concessions to the treaty critics. I have been told that the controversial Article 7 of Treaty No. 1, which concerns the "Right of Reproduction," was dropped at the last minute. This was the Article which deals with "direct and indirect reproduction of their works, whether permanent or temporary, in any manner or form." If this is true, this is a significant victory for the critics of the treaty. In general, we are gratified that the database treaty was rejected -- in our judgment this was the worst of the three treaties, by far. We are also deeply disappointed that Treaties 1 and 2 were approved. These both involved matters of first impression, and should not have been legislated by government employees at a meeting of a United Nations Agency before any national legislature (including our own) had addressed the most important and controversial issues. The Librarian of Congress and many others have expressed similar views. The WIPO meetings are further evidence that in a wide range of important areas, the relevant legislative body is often an International body, like WIPO or the World Trade Organization (WTO), and it is increasingly important for citizens to think AND act globally. Much of the commentary about the WIPO proceedings is available from the Union for the Public Domain (UPD) web page at http://www.public-domain.org CPT held a press conference in Geneva, and the briefing document for that press conferenc is at: http://www.public-domain.org/copyright/briefing.html CPT also joined with several groups to send an open letter to the WIPO delegates, which is at: http://www.public-domain.org/copyright/signon.html More later. jamie ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ James Love / love@tap.org / P.O. Box 19367, Washington, DC 20036 Voice: 202/387-8030; Fax 202/234-5176 Center for Study of Responsive Law Consumer Project on Technology; http://www.essential.org/cpt Taxpayer Assets Project; http://www.tap.org ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ From: Willard McCarty Subject: OPSIS: interdisciplinary conference on perception Date: Sat, 21 Dec 1996 10:50:07 +0000 () X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 259 (259) The following, from the Classical Association of Canada Bulletin, should be of interest to some Humanists: b) OPSIS: An Interdisciplinary Graduate Student Conference April 4-6, 1997 Department of Classics, SUNY at Buffalo Under the theme OPSIS, the graduate students at the State University of New York at Buffalo are planning an interdisciplinary conference dealing with issues of PERCEPTION. Papers are encouraged from graduate students in a variety of disciplines: Classics, Art History, Philosophy, Anthropology, Classical Archaeology, English, Comparative Literature, Media Studies, Political Science, et alia. One of our main goals is to continue the precedent begun with last year's successful conference, TRANSLATIO (translation or transformation). This year we have chosen the theme of OPSIS, for which papers should address questions of perception relating to the ancient world - id est, interpretations of the archaeological record, women and gender, race, the individual within the collective, theatrical performance and audience, the source material for aesthetic writing in modern literature, the portrayal of ancient archetypes in popular cinema.... Papers should be 15-20 minutes in presentation. All submissions should be one-page abstracts of approximately 300 words (no full-length papers, please). Mail submissions to: OPSIS Conference c/o Department of Classics 712 Clemens Hall SUNY Buffalo Buffalo, NY 14260 DEADLINE: February 7, 1997 Notifications are scheduled for early March. For more information, contact: Holly An' Oyster or Melissa Considine (716) 885-3788 oyster@acsu.buffalo.edu or: Allison Glazebrook amg5@acsu.buffalo.edu Conference Co-sponsored by: Graduate Student Association, Sub Board I, Inc., Raymond Chair, Department of Classics, and Classics Graduate Student Association ------------------------------------------------ Dr. Willard McCarty, Senior Lecturer King's College London / Strand / London WC2R 2LS +44 0171 873-2784 / Willard.McCarty@kcl.ac.uk http://www.kcl.ac.uk/kis/schools/hums/ruhc/wlm/ From: Gabriel Pereira Lopes Subject: cfp- IBERAMIA98 Date: Fri, 20 Dec 1996 09:51:07 -0500 X-Humanist: Vol. 10 Num. 260 (260) Could you please forward this announcement to those you think may be interested in applying? IBERAMIA-98 SIXTH IBEROAMERICAN CONFERENCE ON ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE Lisbon, Portugal, October 5-9, 1998 (Under the auspices of the Portuguese Association for Artificial Intelligence) The age of AI atlantic discoveries "The portuguese dared to engage the great oceanic sea. They entered it fearlessly. They discovered new islands, new lands, new seas, new peoples, and what is more important, new heavens and new stars ... Now it is clear that these discoveries ... were not achieved through guesswork: our seamen set off well trained and provided with instruments and rules of astronomy and geometry." from Pedro Nunes, 1537 The Sixth IberoAmerican Conference on Artificial Intelligence will be held at Lisbon, Portugal, on October 5-9, 1998, under the auspices of the Portuguese Association for Artificial Intelligence (APPIA), in a unique cultural environment, precisely the headquarters of Fundacao Calouste Gulbenkian (two museums, one for Modern Art and another for Classical Art, covering also the private collection of the founder, a library, permanent expositions, and a beautiful garden). At the same time the World Exposition (Expo'98), around the main topic of Oceans and commemorating the portuguese sea discovery of India (1498), will be open in the oriental side of Lisbon, creating a historic context for discussing the cooperation within the sciences of the artificial among the countries of the Atlantic rein, and under the theme of AI atlantic discoveries. Established in 1988 (Barcelona) by three Iberoamerican Associations of AI (AEPIA, SMIA and APPIA), after a first meeting in Morelia (Mexico) in 1986 of SMIA and AEPIA, the event was organized every two-years since then in Morelia (1990), La Habana (1992), Caracas (1994) and Cholula (1996), taking Portuguese and Spanish as oficial languages and with the aim to promote and difuse the research and development carried out in the countries associated with those two latin languages and connected by strong historical links from XVI century. Along the years, the Executive Committee of IBERAMIA was enlarged with the inclusion of AVINTA (Venezuela), SMC (Cuba) and SBC (Brazil). IBERAMIA-98 will run for the first time in a decade with a paper track in English (for submission and presentation) in order to close the links now with other AI communities where AI is more developed and explored. Structure The scientific program will be structured along two main modules, the open discussion and the paper track. October 5, a bank holiday in Portugal, may be dedicated to see the World Fair Expo'98. The first day of the Conference (tuesday) is organized with tutorials directed to informatics professionals, the formal opening, the IBERAMIA lecture delivered by a distinguished iberoamerican researcher, and the declaration of the prize Jose Negrete awarded by the Scientific Committee to the best paper submitted. Also, and in parallel, working groups will be organized in order to discuss general topics (eg. scientific and industrial joint cooperation). The open discussion track (wednesday) will be composed by working sessions devoted to the most important areas of research in iberoamerican countries, the AI Education Symposium dedicated to confront ideas about the best ways to teach AI, a session to present the best M. Sc. or Ph. D. thesis of the whole region, and a video conference panel to establish bridges between Europe and America (involving those unable to attend this panel). The paper track (thursday and friday) will be composed by invited talks and paper presentations from all over the world on the full range of AI research and covering both theoretical and foundational issues, and applications as well. Some Workshops will be organized the week before, namely one on Distributed Artificial Intelligence (following the first one in Xalapa (Mexico) in 1996, before IBERAMIA-96, and on any other topics to be proposed by those interested in activating the current research. During the Conference there will be an exposition of books written by iberoamerican researchers and academics, access to the WWW pages of the AI associations sponsering the event, and demonstrations of AI industrial products designed in eberoamerican countries. The portuguese association (APPIA) will organize the week before the Sixth Advanced School on AI (EAIA-98) adopting English as the official language. Paper presentations The first track will be held mainly in latin languages (Portuguese and Spanish), but also in English (depending on the preference of the authors). The papers may be written in English. The second track will be conducted only in English. Publication The invited lecture and the papers of the open discussion track will be published in the Proceedings of the Conference. The organizers intend to arrange the publication of the contributions to the paper track by some international publishing house. Submission Submissions are namely requested in the following topics: Agent-oriented programming Case-based reasoning Computer vision Constraint programming Database mining tools and aplications Explanation mechanisms Foundations issues Genetic algorithms Hypothetical reasoning Intelligent information retrieval Intelligent tutoring and learning environments Knowledge acquisition Knowledge representation Knowledge-based systems validation Model-based reasoning Multi-agent and distributed problem-solving Natural language processing Neural nets Robotics Temporal and spatial reasoning Symbolic learning Important Dates Deadline for submission of papers (Open Discussion and Full International tracks): February, 1, 1998 Deadline for submission of tutorials, working groups and workshops proposals: April 2, 1998 Deadline for submission of proposals for the concurse of the best thesis (M. Sc. or Ph. D.): April 2, 1998 (Chair: Dr. Jaime Sichman, Escola Politecnica, Universidade de Sao Paulo, Av. Professor Luciano Gualberto, no 158, travessa 3, CEPO 5508-900 Sao Paulo, SP, Brasil, jaime@pcs.usp.br) Notification of acceptance of papers: May 15, 1998 Notification of acceptance of tutorials, working groups, and workshops: Jun