NeDiMAH workshop on ontology based annotation

The aim of this workshop is to present and discuss
current ontology based annotation in text studies
and to give participants an introduction and updated
insight to the field. One of the expected outcomes
from the workshop is to throw light on the
consequences and experiences of a renewed database
approach to computer assisted textual work, based
on the developments over the last decade in text
encoding as well as in ontological systems.
1. The NeDiMAH Network
The Network for Digital Methods in the Arts
and Humanities (NeDiMAH) is a research network
running from 2011 to 2015, funded by the European
Science Foundation, ESF. The network will examine
the practice of, and evidence for, advanced ICT
methods in the arts and humanities across Europe,
and articulate these findings in a series of outputs and
publications. To accomplish this, NeDiMAH provides
a locus of networking and interdisciplinary exchange
of expertise among the trans-European community
of digital arts and humanities researchers, as well as
those engaged with creating and curating scholarly
and cultural heritage digital collections. NeDiMAH
will work closely with the EC funded DARIAH
and CLARIN e-research infrastructure projects, as
well as other national and international initiatives.
NeDiMaH includes the following Working Groups:
1. Spatial and temporal modelling,
2. Information visualisation,
3. Linked data and ontological methods,
4. Developing digital data
5. Using large scale text collections for research
6. Scholarly digital editions
The WGs will examine the use of
formal computationally-based methods for the
capture, investigation, analysis, study, modelling,
presentation, dissemination, publication and
evaluation of arts and humanities materials for
research. To achieve these goals the WGs will
organise annual workshops and whenever possible,
the NeDiMAH workshops will be organised in
connection with other activities and initiatives in the
field.
The NeDiMAH WG3, Linked data and ontological
methods, proposes to organise a preconference
workshop ‘Ontology based annotation’ in connection
with the Digital Humanities 2011 in Hamburg.
2. Motivation and background
The use of computers as tools in the study of textual
material in the humanities and cultural heritage goes
back to the late 1940s, with links back to similar
methods used without computer assistance, such as
word counting in the late nineteenth century and
concordances from the fourteenth century onwards.
In the sixty years of computer assisted text research,
two traditions can be seen. One is that which includes
corpus linguistics and the creation of digital scholarly
editions, while the other strain is related to museum
and archival texts. In the former tradition, texts are
commonly seen as first class feasible objects of study,
which can be examined by the reader using aesthetic,
linguistic or similar methods. In the latter tradition,
texts are seen mainly as a source for information;
readings concentrate on the content of the texts,
not the form of their writing. Typical examples are
museum catalogues and historical source documents.
These two traditions will be called form and content
oriented, respectively. It must be stressed that these
categories are not rigorous; they are points in a
continuum.
Tools commonly connected to museum and archive
work, such as computer based ontologies, can be used
to investigate texts of any genre, be it literary texts
or historical sources. Any analysis of a text is based
on a close reading of it. The same tools can also be
used to study texts which are read according to both
the form oriented and the content oriented way (Eide
2008; Zöllner-Weber & Pichler 2007).
The novelty of the approach lies in its focus on
toolsets for modelling such readings in formal
systems. Not to make a clear, coherent representation
of a text, but rather to highlight inconsistencies as
well as consistencies, tensions as well as harmonies,
in our readings of the texts. The tools used
for such modelling can be created to store and
show contradictions and inconsistencies, as well as
providing the user with means to detect and examine
such contradictions. Such tools are typically used in
an iterative way in which results from one experiment
may lead to adjustments in the model or in the way it
is interpreted, similar to modelling as it is described
Digital Humanities 2012
19
by McCarty (2005). The source materials for this type
of research are to be found in the results of decades
of digital scholarly editing. Not only in the fact that
a wide variety of texts exist in digital form, but also
that many of these texts have been encoded in ways
which can be used as starting points for the model
building. Any part of the encoding can be contested,
in the modelling work as well as in the experiments
performed on the model. The methods developed in
this area, which the TEI guidelines are an example of,
provide a theoretical basis for this approach.
In the end of the 1980ies Manfred Thaller developed
Kleio, a simple ontological annotation system for
historical texts. Later in the 1990s hypertext, not
databases, became the tool of choice for textual
editions (Vanhoutte 2010: 131). The annotation
system Pliny by John Bradley (2008) was design
both as a practical tool for scholars abut also because
Bradley was interested in how scholars work when
studying a text. One of the expected outcomes from
this workshop is to throw light on the consequences
and experiences of a renewed database approach
in computer assisted textual work, based on the
development in text encoding over the last decade as
well as in ontological systems.
A basic assumption is that reading a text includes
a process of creating a model in the mind of the
reader. This modelling process of the mind works
in similar ways for all texts, being it fiction or nonfictions (see Ryan 1980). Reading a novel and reading
a historical source document both result in models.
These models will be different, but they can all be
translated into ontologies expressed in computer
formats. The external model stored in the computer
system will be a different model from the one stored
in the mind, but it will still be a model of the text
reading. By manipulating the computer based model
new things can be learned about the text in question.
This method represents an answer to Shillingsburg’s
call for editions which are open not only for
reading by the reader, but also for manipulation
(Shillingsburg 2010: 181), and to Pichler’s
understanding of digital tools as means to document
and explicate our different understandings and
interpretations of a text (Zöllner-Weber & Pichler
2007).
A digital edition can be part of the text model stored
in the computer system. As tools and representation
shape thinking not only through the conclusions they
enable but also through the metaphors they deploy
(Galey 2010: 100), this model will inevitably lead to
other types of question asked to the text. A hypothesis
is that these new questions will lead to answers
giving new insight into the texts of study. Some of
these insights would not have been found using other
methods.
There is a movement in the humanities from seeking
local knowledge about specific cases (McCarty,
Willard. Humanities Computing. Basingstoke:
Palgrave Macmillan, 2005) which in this respect
are traditional humanities investigations into specific
collections of one or a limited number of texts. The
general patterns sought may rather be found on a
meta-research level where one investigate into new
ways in which research that has a traditional scope
can be performed.
3. A description of target audience
Scholars interested in online and shared annotation
of texts and media based on ontologies. Practice in
the field is not a requirement. Knowlegde of the
concept ‘ontology’ or ‘conceptual model’ can be an
advantage.
The aim of this workshop is to present and discuss
current ontology based annotation in text studies
and to give the participant an introduction and
updated insight in the field and also bringing together
researchers. One of the expected outcomes from this
workshop is to throw light on the consequences
and experiences of a renewed database approach
in computer assisted textual work, based on the
developments over the last decade in text encoding as
well as in ontological systems.
References
Bradley, J. (2008). Pliny: A model for
digital support of scholarship. Journal of Digital
Information 9(1). http://journals.tdl.org/jod
i/article/view/209/198 . Last checked 2011-11-01
Crane, G. (2006). What Do You Do with a Million
Books? D-Lib Magazine 12(3). URL: http://www
.dlib.org/dlib/march06/crane/03crane.html .
(checked 2011-11-01).
Eide, Ø. (2008). The Exhibition Problem. A Reallife Example with a Suggested Solution. Lit Linguist
Computing 23(1): 27-37.
Galey, A. (2010). The Human Presence in Digital
Artefacts’. In W. McCarty (ed.), Text and Genre in
Reconstruction: Effects of Digitalization on Ideas,
Behaviours, Products and Institutions. Cambridge:
Open Book Publishers, pp. 93-117.
McCarty, W. (2005). Humanities Computing.
Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
Moretti, F. (2005). Graphs, maps, trees: abstract
models for a literary history. London: Verso.
Ryan, M.-L. (1980). Fiction, non-factuals, and the
principle of minimal departure. Poetics 9: 403-22.
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20
Shillingsburg, P. (2010). How Literary Works
Exist: Implied, Represented, and Interpreted. In W.
McCarty (ed.), Text and Genre in Reconstruction:
Effects of Digitalization on Ideas, Behaviours,
Products and Institutions. Cambridge: Open Book
Publishers, pp. 165-82.
Kleio-system, http://www.hki.uni-koeln.
de/kleio/old.website/welcome.html , checked
2011-11-01.
Zöllner-Weber, A., and A. Pichler (2007).
Utilizing OWL for Wittgenstein’s Tractatus.
In H. Hrachovec, A. Pichler and J. Wang
(eds.), Philosophie der Informationsgesellschaft /
Philosophy of the Information Society.
Contributions of the Austrian Ludwig Wittgenstein
Society. Kirchberg am Wechsel: ALWS, pp. 248-250.
Vanhoutte, E. (2010) Defining Electronic Editions:
A Historical and Functional Perspective. In W.
McCarty (ed.), Text and Genre in Reconstruction:
Effects of Digitalization on Ideas, Behaviours,
Products and Institutions. Cambridge: Open Book
Publishers, pp. 119-44.