Digital humanities and the elusive “thing”

Abstract

The present article examines the current academic encounter with the “thing” of the digital humanities, i.e., with the digital as both a source of crisis and an attempt to control this crisis. By mapping conceptualisations of the digital as an object of study, a tool and the constitution of new practices, the “thing” is presented from the threefold perspective of access, evidence and control: access as the newfound availability and emancipation of the digital object, evidence as the cognitive approach marshalled in response to the surge of data, and control as the new ruling practice, whether academic, ethical or critical. The article seeks to demonstrate that the “thing” cannot be immediately grasped or pinned down, that whenever you think you have it, it turns out to be somewhere else. The proposed threefold perspective of access, evidence, and control is but a way of closing in on something that remains forever elusive.