Data and Digital Humanities MSc

Core modules:

E-Portfolio

This module enables you to design a digital product, service, performance, installation or artefact which uses cultural data. The  design might be to address a problem or a need, or to communicate ideas, and be of value to people in academia, business, arts, heritage or the community. You will create an e-portfolio of written pieces and practical work such as drawings, designs and example data. You will be able to demonstrate self-directed learning, critical judgement, ideas and creativity, building on knowledge acquired throughout your MA, as evidence for future employers.

60 credits

Introduction to Cultural Data

This module examines cultural data, including methods for creating, analysing and communicating data. Cultural data is digital data about human culture and society, past and present: from ancient documents, artefacts and environments to present-day social media, digital arts and virtual worlds. Cultural data also uses a wide range of digital methods for its creation, analysis and communication, such as digitisation, crowdsourcing, AI, data visualisation, apps, digital exhibitions, and user-centred design. You will learn the principles, methods and tools for working with all types of cultural data, preparing you for a career in the media, information and cultural sectors.

30 credits

Managing Digital Projects

This module examines project management in the context of developing data products and digital performances. Data products might be websites, databases, apps, or virtual environments which use cultural content. Digital performances might include music, art, video or digital exhibitions in which the practices and/or the outputs are digital. The module will teach the skills and tools necessary to manage the design, planning and execution of a digital project, including: developing ideas; understanding user requirements; developing specifications for design teams; planning; choosing the best design and development methodology. The module does not require the product or performance to be executed.

30 credits

Plus the below:
- Introduction to AI in the Humanities
- Work Experience in Digital Humanities
- Culture and Heritage

Optional modules:

Social Media and Culture

This module will introduce students to the earliest and most current forms of social media and its critical significance within the arts, humanities, and culture. The module defines not only what makes media interactions and content 'social', but the vastly divergent types of social media networks outside of the current, Western-based 'Big Five' (Facebook, X, Instagram, Youtube, and TikTok), which have been over-emphasised both in recent scholarship and pop culture. Students will not only discuss key user personas and patterns that have shifted as such networks became more globally pervasive on mobile devices, but study the numerous ways that international platforms' competing developments of tools, features, and haptics, from in-app video-editing to built-in AI chats, have directly shaped human culture. 

The course will strengthen students' ability to critically evaluate ways that social media has been wielded in different spheres of the arts and humanities to shift lines of marginalisation and power in both sweeping and subtle formats, simultaneously opening and gatekeeping access for different Othered groups. They will also compare examples of individuals and whole communities that have subsumed or resisted these fluctuating dynamics. Not only will students encounter leading social media theory such as Actor-Network Theory, Attention Economics, UGT (Uses and Gratification), or Cognitive Dissonance Theory, but they will learn sample methods for scraping and collecting social media statistics and identifying significant cultural trends at a condensed scale. 

Throughout seminars and formative and summative assessments, students will combine such practical and rigorous data analysis with theoretical evaluation to investigate shifting dynamics within these new digital cultures. Whether in critical discussion, in-depth written analysis, or mixed-method projects and applications, students will ultimately reflect on how social media not only affects their future careers in the arts and humanities, but their contribution to more equitable global digital citizenship.

This module does not assume any previous knowledge or experience with digital tools.

15 credits

Designing Cultural Data Products

This module examines how cultural data products are designed. Cultural data products might be websites, databases, information services, apps, virtual environments, digital art or digital exhibitions which use cultural content. The module will teach methods, tools and best practices for designing and disseminating cultural data products, including: understanding why good design is important; developing user-led interfaces; understanding how websites, systems, apps and tools are built; user testing; managing IP and data ethics; developing dissemination plans. The module will not teach you how to program in code, and no software programming skills are required. You will have the opportunity to work in groups to invent your own product and develop a user interface and dissemination plan during the module.

15 credits

Digital Methods in Practice

This module aims to give students a practical overview of Digital Humanities, a subject which uses data science methods to provide a better understanding of arts, humanities and cultural data for research purposes. Building on the methodological introductions given in the IPA61001 module 'Introduction to Cultural Data', this module will present and discuss actual case studies that exemplify how digital approaches can be used to ask novel and ground-breaking research questions using cultural data. The module includes hands-on sessions where students will learn basic principles of selected digital tools, including text encoding, data visualisation, data analysis and 3D modelling, and be able to complete simple digital projects. Real-life cultural datasets will be used during the hands-on sessions, to give students the opportunity to encounter, and learn to tackle, the most common issues in the application of these technologies in research contexts. 



Attending this module, students will acquire a more concrete understanding of digital approaches to cultural data, learn how to critically leverage the specificity of the different data formats, and become familiar with current best practices.





This module does not assume any previous knowledge or experience with digital tools.

15 credits

Digital Cultural Heritage: Theory and Practice

This module examines the theoretical and methodological advances in Digital Cultural Heritage and their broader implications in fields concerned with the interpretation and presentation of the past. We will draw on theoretical readings as well as analyse the potential benefits and drawbacks of certain digital and online approaches. Topics include: principles and theories underlying Digital Cultural Heritage, understanding processes of creating digital surrogates, establishing principles for user experience, and exploring digital narratives for public dissemination. A major component of this module will be a semester-long project that will require the development of a proposal for a digital cultural heritage project.

15 credits

Plus the below:
- Data and Language Analytics